The Second Generation
by TexanRose
Summary: As Leia grows up, she wonders why Chancellor Amidala will never admit the truth about her mother. Leia/Han Anakin/Padme Mara/Luke and some Sabe/Obi-Wan
1. Leia

**A/N This is something that kind of just came out while I was writing. I know the style is a little different, but I really like it. Please give it a try. I do not own Star Wars or any of the characters in this story. **

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Sometimes Leia wondered why the Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic never told her, why she never confirmed this feeling that sank deep into her gut and then shot upwards as if it were eating at her soul. She had a memory, perhaps the first moments of her life that she could recall, of green grass and white shua flowers that grew in the Lake Country of her home planet. She was laughing. The Senator was there, breading shua flowers into her hair. There was a man there too, but Leia couldn't remember him well at all. She supposed he was her father, but her father was dead. He had been for years.

Leia knew that when she was younger that there were things she couldn't understand. Things that she might never know, but every daughter had a right to know who her mother was, even the slave daughters who were worked in misery at the far reaches of Hutt space. When she first asked where her mother was, when she became aware that normal people didn't live in the household of the Nubian queen, when she understood that she was somehow less than family but somehow more than a servant, when she heard her tutor shake his head at her loneliness, she was told that her mother was far away, that her mother couldn't be with her now.

Leia remembered those answers well. They were cold condolences to a sad child. They were the harsh realities that comforted her as she fell asleep on her tear-stained pillow. She had no mother. She had no one but the then-Senator of the Chommell Sector. She was Leia's guardian, Leia's protector. But she never acknowledged herself as Leia's mother. She never acted like Leia's mother either. They rarely talked. Occasionally, the Senator had asked about her lessons with her tutor, about whether or not she was happy. Of course she told the Senator she was delighted to be a part of her household. How she could she reply otherwise? How did a child explain to the person past childhood that children were not meant to be alone, to be without friends or comforters? There was a void in Leia's heart deeper than even the deepest part of the Maw. But she admitted this to no one. Not even to herself.

When the Senator was made Supreme Chancellor, Leia was left on Naboo with her tutor and with Sabé, a handmaiden who preferred semi-retirement to the politics on the capital. She was left if near-isolation for six standard years. It was then she started to wonder about the family that left her alone, to celebrate alone during mid-winter festivals and coronations without merriment, to listen to Sabé's stories without relief. But when she had finally gathered the courage to ask Sabé who she was, where she came from, she was told that only the Chancellor had the answers, only the Chancellor could tell her, only…, so Leia never asked again. She only immersed herself more in her school work; she began to follow the politics of the Chancellor closely, so that when it was time, she would know…she would know what it is she needed to know.

Leia both loved and hated the Lake Country. It was her home; it was her prison. It was a fortress no man could scale, save one. She saw him sometimes in her dreams. He was kind to her. He smiled at her. And while Leia knew he was just the spectator of a dream, a ghost of someone she knew could never be, sometimes she felt him watching her as she slept. It was a good feeling, one that reminded her that she was not alone in the universe. Sometimes when she woke up, the feeling lingered, warming the hole in her heart. But other times it disappeared as soon as she awoke.

A year ago, Leia partially solved the mystery of her birth. She had been having her history lesson, and she saw a holo of the Chancellor, a holo of when the Chancellor was much younger. Leia wasn't her spitting image. Her face had a hardness that the Chancellor's lacked. Her chin was too sharp, her nose was too angular, her eyes were too hard, but the resemblance was there. It was enough for Leia to slam the door on her tutor and cry herself to sleep. Her mother had never wanted her, had never even acknowledged her, had never wanted a daughter to trouble herself with. Because her mother was too busy doing other things…like running the galaxy. Because that fateful day, she discovered that Chancellor Amidala was more than her guardian—she was her mother, too.

If Sabé ever reported the incident to the Chancellor, Leia never knew about it. After that day, she passed her days as she had all the rest, living in her prison world and waiting for the summons she knew would one-day come. And they did come, on her nineteenth birthday. Sabé was elated when she told Leia that the Chancellor had decided she was ready to be of service, that she would be pleased if Leia would serve as her handmaiden on Coruscant. Leia knew there would be no refusing her, and so she went. She wasn't sure if it was with an angry heart or a hopeful one that she traveled across the galaxy to reach Chancellor Amidala. But she went with the determination that she would find out answers. Even if answers were better left unsaid.

Leia had been serving the Chancellor for less than a year when she met him. He was shy and mumbled when he spoke to her. But she liked him anyway. He was a Jedi apprentice sometimes assigned to watch over the Chancellor when other Jedi masters had more urgent matters to attend. He watched over the Chancellor, but sometimes Leia suspected it was the Chancellor who was watching him. He said his name was Luke.

It was the first time Leia had a friend her own age, someone she could share secrets with without worrying about the Chancellor finding out. And sometimes between errands or on quiet nights they would talk, when they discussed the stars as Dormé said when the two young people visited in the quiet of the Chancellor's private rooms. And Leia almost told him about her fears, about her desire to know the truth. She would have if he had not told her one night when only the clone detail that watched over the 500 Republica caused noise outside the Chancellor's window, when the Chancellor was already engulfed in a deep sleep, that Jedi had no family. They were raised without knowing where they came from or who their parents were. He said it was such matter-of-factness, with such hopelessness that her pity for him became greater than the sadness she had for herself.

Later, Leia was glad she withheld her suspicions and fears from being spoken out loud. Because when she met Luke's master, a Jedi named Obi-Wan, a man with guarded eyes and orthodox Jedi views, something told her that he was someone she should be careful around. Even though his smile was pleasant and he was always friendly, she felt as if he were hiding something from her, something he was deliberately trying to avoid saying or doing. Because of this tingling in her fingertips, she only spoke to him when it was absolutely necessary. The Jedi was a paradox of sorts because he lit up when he saw Leia and delighted in her presence even if he had secrets to hide from her…or secrets about her as the case seemed.

But because Leia's quest for answers could not be halted or advanced by the presence of a Jedi master and his padawan, she pursued her mission anyway. But when after one standard year she was no closer to the truth than when she first arrived on Coruscant, she knew that she had to become more than just a handmaiden, more than someone who was a replica of five others. She was close to the Chancellor, but she was not close enough. She needed to make herself valuable, she needed to make herself known. She needed an excuse to get closer to the Chancellor herself.

The opportunity presented itself when Leia volunteered herself for a diplomatic mission that required the utmost secrecy and tact. She agreed to go to Corellia and find a smuggler who could provide vital information about the Hutts that could sway a crucial vote in the Senate. In the company of the newly-knighted Jedi Luke Starkiller, she would look like a woman and her brother on a visit to Corellia. She and Luke would blend in, disappear, not make themselves noticed. She would find the smuggler and validate his information. She had to. It was her only chance of proving herself to the Chancellor, to her mother.

The mission was a success. Luke was a pleasant and helpful companion even if the smuggler, a man by the name of Han Solo, was not. He was crass and he smelled. His furry carpet of a copilot, a Wookie, was little more than a nuisance, too. Leia was more than happy to leave the pair behind on Corellia while she became invaluable to the Chancellor. Chancellor Amidala came to rely on her for her political advice which she took more often than not. Leia was let into more than just the Chancellor's world of dresses and frippery. She was let into the Chancellor's real universe of decision-making and fateful political meetings. She was given the opportunity to look into the Chancellor's mind, to see how her thought-process worked.

She learned that Chancellor Amidala was naturally kind, but harsh when occasion demanded. She was brilliant in her professional realm, but fretted when it came to her personal life. She saw the Jedi as an asset whose beliefs she would never fully realize or understand. She believed the Hutts were power-hungry beasts who needed to be stripped of their power. She loved Naboo even if she had not been there in years. She was distant with her family because of the choices she had made about her life. She preferred her own company above that of nearly anyone. Most of all, Leia came to learn that when her eyes clouded over with mist, she got lonely and sad too.

But the Chancellor never confessed the existence of a daughter, and as Leia passed from her twentieth to her twenty-first standard year, she kept on waiting. What she was waiting for she wasn't exactly sure, a moment perhaps or a feeling of some sort. In the meantime, she became a liaison between the Chancellor and the smuggler Han Solo. He became a spy for the Chancellor, feeding her office information about the Hutts. While Leia knew he hated them as much as she did, she knew Solo spied not out of the goodness of his heart, but because of the credits that flowed into his bank account. She didn't like the work, but it kept her in the Chancellor's good graces. And she intended to stay there. She probably would have, too, if the Chancellor had not been summoned before the Jedi Council during Leia's twenty-second standard year.

Master Yoda, Leia knew, was the Grandmaster of the Jedi Order. At over nine-hundred- standard-years-old, he was older, wiser, smarter, stronger, and even faster than any other Jedi in the Order. Or so it was said. When Master Yoda came to visit the personal chambers of Chancellor Amidala. The Chancellor and the old Jedi sat behind closed doors for what seemed like hours. Leia could feel anger, fear, and even mourning come behind those doors. He had come to give the Chancellor summons and information about someone or something Leia sensed. And even if such a feeling had not over-taken her, she saw it in the Chancellor's tear-streaked face when she let Master Yoda out the door. But the oddest thing about the entire event was when the Jedi looked at Leia with those great green eyes of his with such intensity, Leia sensed he was searching her soul.

But the moment passed so swiftly, Leia thought she had imagined it, and shook the feeling off. However, when Leia, and only Leia, accompanied the Chancellor at dawn three days later to the Jedi Temple, she supposed that maybe she was not imagining things. Although Leia was permitted to walk hallowed columned walls of the Jedi Temple that morning, she was not permitted inside the Council chamber itself. She waited outside of it for the Chancellor. She could not hear what went on within, but she was very much aware of what was going on outside the room. She saw the Coruscanti sunrise, she noticed the plain pattern of the hallway's carpet, she took note of the Jedi laws carved outside the Council chamber's door. _There is no ignorance, there is knowledge_. It was strange for someone for whom ignorance had been a way of life to be told that knowledge was the key to all. But most of all, Leia noticed the figure cloaked in black down the hall who seemed to be staring at her, an outsider, intently.

When the sun bathed the city-planet in brightness, Leia and the Chancellor left the Temple. The Chancellor was silent and angry. And hurt, Leia guessed. They never spoke of that day. It was only days later, when Han asked with a roguish grin if she was angry at her boss, that Leia realized she was. She completed their usual transaction with little more words than necessary before leaving him. She was upset, hurt, angry, tired, frustrated, and most of all, she wondered what it was about the Jedi that unsettled her. She confessed her thoughts to no one and nothing except the dark recesses of her own mind.

She grew even more unsettled when the Senator of Chommell Sector, Pooja Naberrie of Naboo, had a private meeting with the Chancellor in her personal apartment. The Senator and the Chancellor had never been close, despite having come from the same home-planet. Nevertheless, the argument that ensued behind closed doors seemed more like a family squabble than a political discussion. It caused C-3PO, the Chancellor's protocol droid, to short-circuit. When the Senator left, she gave Leia, who had been waiting attentively outside the door, a curious look that turned into one of disturbance. When Leia rose to help dress the Chancellor the next morning, she found the dresser mirror shattered into shards of crystal glass and the Chancellor asleep in her bed, exhausted, clutching what seemed to Leia to be a snippet of jappor.

Somehow Leia knew she was on the verge of finding her answers, but even as she was on the cusp of everything she had wanted to know, she shied away from it. She had grown comfortable on Coruscant. Too comfortable. She needed a distraction. She needed to get away. She needed to escape the loneliness that still consumed her. She requested permission to join Han Solo on his next mission. She was slightly hurt when she saw that the Chancellor needed very little of an excuse to send her away. Leia was gone for the next three standard months.

She traveled with Han aboard his traveling junkyard, the _Millenium Falcon_, and visited his smooth-talking friends, the most disreputable of them all, a spice baron named Lando Calrissian. She even ventured into the palace of Jabba the Hutt disguised as a bounty hunter. She found herself enjoying the mission, admitting that Solo wasn't so bad, becoming close to the Wookie Chewbacca. She had expected the distraction of it all. She hadn't expected her to find herself liking Han so much. One night, on the return trip back to Coruscant, they got drunk enough to talk to each other about their pasts. She divulged her lonely childhood, about not growing up without a family. She even admitted to her dreams about the man who was nice to her. He told her about growing up in Corellia and fending for himself. It was only after much prodding and prying that he admitted that he was a member, a somewhat removed member (as in he had removed himself), of the royal family of Corellia. Perhaps, the shock was too readily apparent on her face because he burst out laughing at her expression. A few drinks later, they grew more serious, and he kissed her.

It wasn't Leia's first kiss, and she supposed it wouldn't be her last, but she wasn't sure how she felt about him. She knew Han sensed her reluctance. They barely spoke a word to each other when he landed on Coruscant. As Leia exited the landing ramp, she understood that although she had come to Coruscant to unravel the mysteries that surrounded her life, she was becoming tangled in more secrets that she didn't understand. She took the next several weeks to consider her options before going to a place she could not return from.

In the end, a decision was made for Leia. The Chancellor resigned from office before the completion of her second term, citing personal and familial needs. The entire Republic was thrown into chaos. But Chancellor Amidala took this all calmly. She had her staff pack up her office, her household put in order, and made sure that Vice-Chancellor Mon Mothma of Chandrilla was ready for the task that lay ahead of her. Within a standard month, all traces of the former Chancellor's presence on the capital planet disappeared.

Lady Amidala arrived on Naboo earlier to than the rest of her staff. She had requested only the presences of Leia as her ward, and Luke as a Jedi protection detail. She did not land in Theed and request an audience with the Queen. A Chancellor did not need to answer to anyone. Instead, Luke landed the ship in the northern part of the planet. Leia shook her head when she saw where they were. It was the place that had once been her prison, her fortress. They were back in the Lake Coutnry of Naboo. Leia shook her head and shuddered as Lady Amidala urged Luke to check the perimeter of her home for threats. Leia found her feet unable to move forward.

"Why?" she whispered into the wind, finding her voice.

"Did you say something?" asked Lady Amidala.

"Why?" repeated Leia, angrily this time. "I won't go back there. I can't. It, it was my prison, my lady," she said, her voice getting softer.

Lady Amidala looked at the younger woman with compassion and genuine regret in her eyes. "I am so sorry, Leia, but if you come this one last time, I promise that all the answers you've been seeking will be found inside."

Leia shook her head fiercely. "How do you know what I answers I'm looking for?"

"I know much more than you think, Leia," said Lady Amidala. "I know about your sadness, your hurt, your fears, your hopes, your dreams." The woman's eyes clouded with tears. "Come, please, this one last time," she pleaded.

For a brief moment, Leia saw the years of burden that Lady Amidala had carried on her shoulders, the weight of her decisions, the dashed hopes of her dreams. She saw the years that wore on her. And for the first time, Leia mourned with her. And for the last time, Leia followed her.

Luke greeted them worriedly in the entry way of the mansion. "I sense a strange presence, my lady."

Lady Amidala half-smiled. "I've been expecting him."

She opened the doors to the drawing room, a place where Leia often spent her afternoons reading. A man in a black-cloak greeted the trio, happiness shining in his eyes for a brief moment before Lady Amidala shook her head. Leia recognized his presence although she could not remember having met him. Meanwhile, Luke had gone pale with concern.

"Master Skywalker?" he asked hesitantly.

"Yes, Luke." The man flashed a frightened Luke a friendly smile of understanding before turning his attention to Leia.

"Luke has been taught that I am a criminal. That I am to be feared. That I am not to be trusted," he told her.

"But I have not been taught such things," answered Leia, defiantly lifting her chin. He didn't frighten her in the slightest. "I was not raised in the Temple as he has been."

"Who do your feelings tell you I am?"

Leia looked at him, confused for a moment before reaching into her memory, and what seemed into her very heart for a response. Her head snapped towards him when she had her answer. "You're the man from my dreams. And…you're the one who watched me in the Jedi Temple. The hooded cloak."

He nodded. "Do you fear me?"

Leia shook her head. "Something about you is familiar."

"What was my crime, Luke?" he asked, turning his attention back to the young Jedi.

Luke swallowed nervously before answering hoarsely, "A forbidden attachment."

"And my sentence?"

"Twenty-two years of isolation on Mustafar. The years of your life over again. Twenty-two years for the twenty-two spent dishonoring the Code." Luke's voice shook.

Skywalker looked at her again. "Now you know why he fears me. He believes darkness has touched me."

"There is light in you," Leia answered calmly. Luke looked at her, eyebrows raised. Skywalker smiled gently, his blue eyes dancing. His eyes, Leia noticed, that were similar to Luke's.

"That's what Padmé says," Skywalker told her.

"Who is Padmé?" asked Leia.

He responded by looking at the woman who stood behind her. Lady Amidala.

"My lady?" Luke asked hesitantly.

"Let me tell you a story," she began, urging them to settle themselves on the furniture. It was a long story that spanned forty-four years. It was about a young boy who fell in love with a queen, a man who fell in love with a Senator, a Jedi who married a woman he had no right to love. It was about a war that was destroyed before it could be declared, a Sith Lord who escaped into darkness, a government that was left in shambles. In the midst of all this, a woman gave birth to two children, twins, and her Jedi could no longer hide from the Council. For breaking the law, he was sentenced to isolation, and he children were to be raised in the Temple to ensure that the second generation would not repeat the mistakes of the first. Although the mother begged for the right to raise her own children, they denied her. But she continued to plead until they gave her her daughter, upon the oath that she would not to claim her daughter as her own. Attachments were too strong in the Jedi's family and such power could be corrupted. But when the years of the sentence were over, the Jedi returned to find his family broken, and the Council found his attachments stronger than ever. His wife had buried herself in her work to avoid the truth, but when the truth could no longer be avoided, she begged the Jedi Council to reunite her with her husband. They refused. They feared the darkness within him, for during his time in isolation, he confronted the Sith Lord and destroyed him. But such an encounter cannot leave a man unchanged, but it was the love of his wife that kept light in him, that kept him faithful to his promises and his vows. He swore he would see his children again. But eventually the Jedi Council relented. He had grown too powerful for them to refuse. He embraced both the light and the dark. He was serene, unemotional, knowledgeable, in harmony with the universe. But he also understood emotion, passion, ignorance, and even chaos. He could have conquered the galaxy, but he chose to conquer the law instead. He became a master of himself, and when he reunited with his wife, it was with more love than either of them had ever known and with longing for their family to be complete.

Leia listened to Lady Amidala's words in wonder and in awe. And even though she knew she was being told the story of her own life, she felt as if she had heard it before, as if she had already known. Because Lady Amidala was confirming what Leia had suspected all along, that Leia and Luke were her own children and that Leia's father was not dead. The family stayed up late into the early hours of the morning. They planned, they wished, they hoped, and they dreamed, and as Leia recalled what she had believed was her earliest memory, she discovered that it was not a memory at all, but her mother's dearest wish for what could have been.

And as the days passed in quick succession, Leia found herself hoping that she wouldn't find herself wishing like her mother. She didn't want to live life hoping for what could have been. A standard month after the family reunion, she found herself on Corellia looking for Han Solo. She had to tell him she loved him. Even if he already knew. Because she didn't want to spend the next part of her life wondering what could have been. The Jedi Council had taught her that the mistakes of the first generation should not be made by the second. Because Leia wanted her daughter to know what it felt like to be sheltered in her father's arms, to be at home, to be at peace.

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**A/N The next chapter is from Lady Amidala's point-of-view. **


	2. Lady Amidala

**A/N Thanks for the reviews for those of you who left some. Nothing much else to report except...if you're reading this, could you please let me know? These chapters take hours and hours to write. **

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Looking back, Lady Amidala knew that there was very little she could have done differently to keep her circumstances from unraveling. But even though this knowledge was hardly a comfort, it was the only justification she had for denying Leia's true identity, for waiting for someone who had been sentenced by the galaxy's highest courts, for forgetting that Luke even existed. How she ached for her circumstances to change, how she wanted the pieces of her carefully constructed life to fall back into place. But her life was in tatters. It was permanently torn. The agreement she had made with the Jedi Council was the only way to keep Leia with her, and even then she barely had the security of their promise. No attachments they had said, or Leia would become too much like the father they had exiled. No attachments they had said, or they would take Leia away from her, make sure she would never be touched by anything outside the Temple. She had been taught that time healed all wounds, and so Lady Amidala waited, she waited for that to become true.

With time, she had thought, things would become easier. The truth could be forgotten and life could be accepted. But with time, she learned, the truth became harder to forget and easier to remember. She was not known throughout the galaxy for her personal choices, but only for her personal sacrifices. She was not known for the harshness of her own world, but the easy justice she exerted among her people. On the nights when she wept bitterly into her pillow, Lady Amidala knew that she had received anything but mercy in her own life.

It was with a heavy heart, with a sinking one, that Lady Amidala passed her days. The decision had been made so long ago, when she had nothing left but what she was. Escape into what she was, the Senator of the Chommell Sector, was the only way to leave Padmé Naberrie behind. Because she didn't want to remember who she was or what she did. She didn't want to remember the motherless daughter she was raising or the son she was leaving behind. It was too much hurt for one person to bear.

But Leia was a physical reminder of what she had done. One-half of her legacy to the galaxy. A broken inheritance to be given. Lady Amidala held her at arm's length, fearful of the Jedi Council and its warning. Although Leia lived in her primary Nubian residence in the Lake Country, Lady Amidala rarely saw her. When she did, she only asked her about her studies, and to satisfy her own curiosity, she asked about her happiness. Even if Leia replied that she was happy, if she was content, Lady Amidala knew that she was anything but at peace. She had gotten her curiosity from her father, curiosity that could only lead to things that she would not want to hear, that Lady Amidala would not want to tell her. Inquisitiveness that would lead her into the custody of the Jedi Order.

Fearful of Leia's future, of the part she might play in it, Lady Amidala threw herself even more into her work. She began to spend more time in Coruscant and less time in the Lake Country, that place that was to her the most precious in the galaxy, that place she had hoped would be a home for picnics and family outings. Because her dearest place in the galaxy was also the greatest reminder of what she had done. The second greatest reminder, the greatest reminder had brown hair and eyes to match.

The older she grew, the more Leia looked like her mother, and the more people started asking questions. The more Leia started asking questions about her family. Even a child knew that she had a place in the world, even an orphan. It was then that Lady Amidala did the one thing that would protect her from the Jedi Order and would shelter her from whispers and questions. The one thing that would give Lady Amidala an excuse to escape the constant reminder of what Leia was, to leave her behind in protection on Naboo—she became the Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic.

She left Leia with a few servants and her tutor on Naboo. She quietly asked Sabé to watch over her, protect her, keep her from the prying eyes of the people, of the Jedi. Sabé complied. At thirteen, Leia was only one standard year younger than Lady Amidala had been when she had become queen of a planet. At thirteen, Leia was more sheltered than Lady Amidala had ever been, but if Leia was anything like her mother, she would find a way to break out of her shell of ignorance. If Leia was anything like her father, she would find away to escape the shroud of loneliness, to run away among the stars. Lady Amidala monitored Leia's progress from the other side of the galaxy.

Sabé sent Lady Amidala weekly reports on Leia's progress…on her studies, her personality, her hopes, her dreams. Lady Amidala knew that Sabé did not approve of her methods or the manner in which she was raising Leia. But Sabé did not know the whole story either or completely understand what had passed. So Leia remained on Naboo even on the day she slammed the door on her tutor and cried herself to sleep, even on the day she began studying history with the cunning of a politician. But Leia could not ever become a queen or a senator. The mistakes of her parents would never allow that to happen. The only role Lady Amidala could assign Leia was handmaiden, but not yet, never yet. She worried about the clutches of the Jedi Order.

Even as she escaped Leia's presence on Naboo, Lady Amidala was thrown into the presence of someone she never thought she would meet, never dared hoped to see. His name was Luke.

Everyday, as she saw the Jedi Temple from her office, Lady Amidala hoped and dreamed. And every day, as she saw the Jedi Temple from her office, Lady Amidala's hopes and dreams were ground into dust. She refused an audience with Master Kenobi, with Master Windu, with Master Mundi, with Master Gallia. But she summoned Master Yoda into her own presence, the weight of her position cushioning her from anything the Council might do to her. Lady Amidala gently demanded that she see Luke Starkiller. To her surprise and relief, Master Yoda did not refuse her. He looked at her with his great green eyes, and Lady Amidala saw that they were filled with as much sadness as her own.

Within the year, Luke Starkiller was added to her protection detail, as he grew older, his assignments to her became more regularly scheduled. He protected her without the supervision of his master or of any of his superiors. Lady Amidala ached with the wish she could have protected him from all that she had done. It was an odd reversal of roles that she hadn't expected would come to pass.

And as Luke Starkiller passed into his nineteenth standard year, as Lady Amidala watched him when he wasn't watching her, she saw reflected in his face Leia's hurt, and Lady Amidala remembered her ward and remembered the dreams she had once had for her motherless daughter. Leia could never be a queen, but Leia could become a handmaiden.

She saw that Leia's presence on the capital had opened her world into the infinite possibilities that Leia never suspected. And some she never knew were being pushed her way. The galaxy was suddenly at her fingertips. As Leia reacquainted herself with her household, and was introduced into the petty politics of the Chancellor's office, Lady Amidala orchestrated her meetings with Luke. She quietly encouraged interaction between the two. She told herself they could comfort each other, console each other, learn about each other. Bridge the gaps between their lives.

She knew they spoke when they supposed her to be sleeping. She knew Leia confided in him and he in her. She knew that Leia enjoyed his company even if she was uneasy in the presence of his master. Leia had as much reason as she to feel discomfort in Master Kenobi's presence. And because of his presence, Lady Amidala kept Leia at an arm's length until she did something, anything, that would give her an excuse to bring her closer. That justification came in the form of Han Solo.

Lady Amidala saw Leia take her opportunity and ensured she would have success, requiring the presence of Luke on her mission. If only Leia knew how much more she was accomplishing, if she knew how she was tying together the pieces of the past with the threads of the future. Poor, sheltered, beautiful Leia went to Corellia, and she succeeded. And Lady Amidala brought her closer, one step in, not into the world of her heart but into the universe that was her mind.

She taught Leia even when Leia didn't understand that she was being taught. She showed Leia how to temper justice with mercy, to be compassionate under pressure, to move the pieces of the political game board, what the purpose was in the spying of the Hutts. Lady Amidala did not tell Leia everything, but the things she did tell her took root and grew. And Leia came to understand the politics surrounding her and the Chancellor. Most of all, Lady Amidala taught Leia about the Jedi. They were necessary, they were protectors, but their beliefs could never be understood. Not even by themselves. Their Code was law. And without realizing it, she shared with Leia part of her heart, and a piece of her past.

The life she had created for herself afforded her no adventure, no surprises. She attended Senate debates, committee meetings, political affairs. She spent her time in the company of Vice-Chancellor Mon Mothma and her ally, Viceroy Organa. She avoided the Senator of the Chommell Sector whose home-planet was Naboo, even to the point of refusing meetings with the Senator. She spoke to the Jedi only when absolutely necessary. She watched over Luke and oversaw Leia's daily schedule. She quietly encouraged Leia to get close the smuggler Solo. It served the purpose of fulfilling the promise she had made a long time ago to a little boy about the Hutts. But she also saw that Leia enjoyed his company even if she refused to say so. Lady Amidala wanted Leia to be as happy as she possibly could. And Leia's life might have been a happy one if not for the day Master Yoda came.

He came with his gimmer stick and drooping shoulders into her personal quarters, and Lady Amidala suddenly knew that her past had suddenly become her present. Behind closed doors, she finally heard the news she had waited for twenty-two years to hear. _He_ was alive and had been brought back to Coruscant and even now was secluded in the Jedi Temple. Master Yoda warned her that He had been touched by darkness, that He was not the same man who had embraced the light. Master Yoda sadly told her that the Council no longer knew what to do with Him.

His crime had been a forbidden attachment, a love that would be preserved at all costs. He had been sent to right his wrongs, sentenced to isolation on Mustafar. Because He had not chosen a side on which to stand. Even after twenty-two years, He still opposed the Jedi Code, the laws which were the very foundation of the Order. It was something the Council could not tolerate. It was something the Council would not tolerate. He was attached as ever, and He was making demands. Demands that should not be met.

Lady Amidala begged. Lady Amidala pleaded. Lady Amidala demanded. Lady Amidala threatened. Lady Amidala broke down and cried at the feet of the Jedi Master. And Master Yoda would still not relent. She saw how his eyes were filled with regret, how his ears wilted until they reached his shoulders. Master Yoda told her that He was well and summoned her to the Council Chambers at sunrise in three standard days. There was much to be discussed. And as Lady Amidala saw him out the door, saw him look at Leia intently, saw him go back to the fortress of the Jedi Temple, she became aware that Master Yoda viewed Leia's life as a price that should not have been paid.

She waited anxiously for three days, her worry hidden underneath a mask of serenity. She confided in no one and nothing, not even in Sabé who knew more of her story than nearly any other being in the galaxy. Instead, when the third day came, she took Leia with her to the sacred halls of the Jedi Temple, and wondered if the Temple would feel like home to Leia or like a prison from which had escaped. She wondered if the Masters would question Leia on her attachments, if they would question her about her past, if they would allow her to know the truth.

Lady Amidala entered the Council Chambers alone, and stood in the center of the room. She saw stony faces and set jaws. She saw the past come back again. They told her what had happened in the wilderness on Mustafar, how He had changed, how He had become more of a threat than ever. They wanted to know what she thought of His request to see His family. And when they asked her what she thought, she knew that she had come here without the power of her position, without the cushion of politics. They asked her and her alone what she wanted.

She replied that the only thing that kept Him anchored to the light was His family. She asked to see Him. They refused. She asked for Him to see Leia. They refused. She asked for Him to be released into her custody. They refused again. She asked for Him to be released from the Jedi Code, from the law that bound them all until they were bleeding from their bindings. They said no.

Lady Amidala lapsed into silence and anger. She wanted to weep with frustration. But tears had never gotten her anything but more heartache. She looked into the face of Master Yoda and saw that he seemed as confused as her. She glanced as Master Kenobi and realized that he was pained by the situation and by his part in it. They argued among themselves, debated the merits and the downfalls of His proposal before she was dismissed. She left the Council chambers one last time, and left an unspoken dream in the Jedi Temple.

As she walked the halls of theTemple one last time, she felt His presence, His eyes upon her and upon Leia. She knew that was impossible. It was only a mirage, an illusion. She went back to her apartment and dismissed her appointments for the rest of the standard day. She even forgot to check on Leia and her thoughts on her Temple excursion.

Leia was pushed further from her mind when the Senator of the Chommell Sector came to visit Lady Amidala in her personal rooms. Another part of her past came crashing into her present. It was a slap in the face.

Pooja Naberrie presumed much about the personal life of the Chancellor, presumed to tell her what her family thought, what her mother wanted. Lady Amidala shouted at the Nubian politician. She told her to mind her own business, that her family knew nothing about want or sacrifice, that her family knew nothing about the Jedi. Lady Naberrie told her to let the past go, to forget about Him, to tell her daughter the truth. To let her daughter live her own life, not to exist in the shadow of her mother's. Lady Amidala ordered Lady Naberrie out of her apartments. She told her that the only family she had left was in pieces, pieces that were beyond her power to reconstruct. She couldn't do it without Him. With that last revelation, Lady Naberrie left, glancing at Leia as she did so. Of course she would. She was curious. They were cousins after all.

Lady Amidala spent the night arguing with herself. She spent the night remembering. Looking in the mirror, she remembered how old she was, how much time had passed, how much she had missed, all the memories she could have made. The Lake Country. Naboo. Tattooine. She clutched the jappor snippet to her heart, taking it out from its hiding place. She shattered the mirror with her hairbrush, so she wouldn't have to look at herself, so wouldn't be reminded. She didn't sleep that night.

At dawn, Leia came to check on Lady Amidala. She pretended to be asleep, she didn't want to see Leia; she didn't want to be reminded. Because Leia looked too much like her father. Eventually, Leia must have sensed her discomfort because she requested to join Solo on his next mission. It was with relief that Lady Amidala gave her permission. Leia's absence would give her time to figure out her next move.

Leia was gone for three months. During that time, Lady Amidala became even more aware of Luke's presence in her life, and of the Naberries' ignorance of his existence. They believed she could mend everything in a few simple steps. What if the Jedi took Luke away from her too? He was one of them, but he also belonged to her. He was her guard, her defender. He was her son.

Lady Amidala thought about her predicament for one standard month. She mourned her circumstances. She looked across Coruscant to the looming spires of the Jedi Temple. He was so close, yet He was so far away. They were worlds apart.

She kept the galaxy in order and the Hutts in check. She did the necessary and mundane business that kept the Republic running. But the more she became absorbed in what she was, the more she remembered who she was. And who He was too. One night, when sleep would not consume her, when she thought she would break into pieces, like the pulling apart of petals from a shua flower, she thought about Him. And like a wish that was finally answered, He was there on her balcony.

He was as she remembered only a little older. His eyes were still blue and his hair still blonde. He wore black Jedi robes, his lightsaber clipped to his belt. He looked at her with longing.

For one moment, Lady Amidala didn't think, didn't wonder, didn't hope. In one breath, she said his name, "Anakin," and rushed into his arms.

"Padmé," he whispered into her hair, holding her close against his body. This was no dream. This was no mirage. And she kissed him just to be sure he was really there, and a moment later, she felt him kissing her back.

She lost herself in the moment, and even as Coruscant buzzed with its nightly activity, she forgot the rest of the galaxy. But when her passion waned, and he held her in his arms, she remembered their children.

"What will they do to us?" Padmé asked.

"To us or to our children?" he responded gently.

"Our family," she replied. "I don't want them to take the little I have left."

"They won't," he said firmly.

"How do you know?"  
He sighed and kissed her on the cheek before rising, pulling his dark robe over himself. As he stared out the balcony, he answered her. "Obi-Wan is the reason I am here tonight. And Sabé," he finished with a small smile. "Obi-Wan sees the need for change in the Jedi Order, and so does Master Yoda. They are wary of me, but they do not fear me."

"Should I be afraid of you?" she asked, wrapping herself in sheets before going to join him.

"Never," he breathed. "But what happened to me on Mustafar…it cannot be explained, only understood."

"Understand what, Anakin?" she asked, her voice cracking.

"That I have been touched by darkness," he explained gently.

"But there is light in you," she protested. "I know there is."

"I have been brushed by both, and that is what the Jedi fear. The unknown." Anakin sighed. "I wish I could explain it to Luke. Maybe he would understand the balance I have now."

"Does he know who you are?" Padmé's voice was small, afraid of the answer.

"He has been told my crime. He seen me confined in the Temple. He has been told to be wary of me."

"So he doesn't know you are his father." Padmé's shoulders sagged with this information.

He lifted her chin with his hand. "And Leia doesn't know you are her mother even if she does suspect. I sensed her in the Temple."

"How?" Padmé asked uncertainly.

"Never mind how. What matters is what we are going to do about it."

"What do you want me to do?" she asked. She would do anything for him, go with him to the ends of space. She wouldn't make the same mistake twice.

"Leave Coruscant and come with me Padmé. Bring our children. Let's tell them the truth together." Anakin looked out at the stars that covered Coruscant's night sky. His face was filled with longing.

"But I'm Chancellor now," Padmé admitted. "I can't just leave that behind."

"Come with me to Naboo, to the Lake Country with Luke and Leia. Let's be a family together," he pleaded. Padmé looked at his face, and knew that she could not say no.

"Tell me everything," she asked. And he did.

Afterwards, Padmé made plans. She spoke her dreams aloud to Anakin, and she saw that they were his dreams to. She asked for time, and he gave it to her. The outside world could not ever know what had happened. Because the outside world could never truly understand. In time, Leia might and perhaps even Luke would know, really know what had passed, but in the meantime, Padmé waited for Leia to come back from her mission and observed Luke as he watched over with his guarded eyes. She knew that he more than anyone in the galaxy, Luke had the most to be angry about, the most misgivings about her story. In the end, she knew that she would end up begging Luke for forgiveness.

Padmé put her affairs in order. She whispered in Sabé's ear that her time on Coruscant was coming to an end. She quietly made sure that Mon Mothma was ready for the position in which she was about to be thrust. She called for several important votes in the Senate, most of which were about dealing with the Hutts. And while she waited, Anakin came to visit her in the darkness of the night, his hooded cloak obscuring his face, whispering to her that they had allies in unexpected places.

When Leia came back, Padmé put the last pieces on the gameboard into play. Then she called for Master Yoda and asked that Luke accompany her back to Naboo. He agreed without hesitation, and he said that Luke would be at her disposal for the rest of her days. She heard the double meaning in his words. In the weeks before she left, she made sure Leia was seen as her favorite, she reminded her household that Leia was her ward. And then she left with Leia and Luke, at a speed so quick that it left little time for anyone to think too much about her plans.

It was a quiet trip back to Naboo. Leia was distracted by something or perhaps someone. The mission she had returned from, had left her close to Han Solo, Padmé knew, but just how close they had become, she didn't quite know. She suspected something had had happened between Solo and Leia. Luke was not distracted, but he was concerned. Supreme Chancellors of the Galactic Republic did not merely resign because of personal issues. Padmé knew his feelings made him suspicious, but how much he knew, she was unsure of.

Luke landed in the Lake Country of Naboo, not far from Padmé's primary Nubian residence. She nodded gently as he asked to check the perimeter. She saw that Leia's face was white with anguish, and she mourned when Leia called this house her prison. Padmé pleaded with her for one last journey inside the homes of the mansion. She begged Leia, and Leia reluctantly complied.

She took a nervous Luke and curious Leia into the drawing room where Anakin waited for them. She aw he instantly brightened in her presence, but when Padmé shook her head that she had not told him, that her children still didn't know who their father was, he was sad again. For the first time, the four family members spoke to each other. And then Padmé urged them to sit down, to make themselves comfortable while she told her story. And as she weaved her tale, she saw understanding dawn in Luke's eyes and familiarity glimmer in Leia's.

In the days after she had finished her story, she spoke to her children. On her knees, she begged Luke for forgiveness. He said that there was no need for begging. Forgiveness had already been given. But even as he mouthed the words, Padmé saw that he fingered the lightsaber clipped onto his belt and that confusion consumed his heart.

Leia was a different matter. The Chancellor she had known for so long had suddenly become her mother. Suddenly, there was a new way of speaking, a new way of acting, a new way of thinking. Padmé saw that even as she spoke to her mother and she pardoned unpardonable actions, Leia clung to her father, learning from him what it was she needed to know.

Leia left a standard month after Padmé had told her story, and as she learned the purpose of Leia's journey, Padmé rejoiced. Because she didn't want her daughter to experience the same pain, the same regret, the same unhappiness that her mother had been burdened with. Love should be enjoyed for a lifetime, not for the fleeting moments of a first light. Leia's generation should not make mistakes that Padmé's had. The second generation of the Skywalker family would not err in the same manner as the first.

Padmé's smiled softly to herself as she thought about the future. Looking out at the Nubian sunset over the Lake, with Anakin embracing her, Padmé remembered the last act she had done as the Chancellor. Lady Amidala had asked the Senate for the reformation of the Jedi Order. The matter, which would solve many problems and cause the Jedi Council to act, the issue which would finally bring peace into her life and into the lives of countless other beings in the galaxy, was still being debated in the Senate.

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**A/N Next chapter is Obi-Wan's pov...and some answers. **


	3. Master Kenobi

**A/N Sorry this took so long to update. I wanted to make sure I got it just right. Please read carefully for details. And please review! Thank you :)**

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Obi-Wan had once, a very long time ago, in a hazy memory, in a dream he couldn't quite remember, had a family. He could recall feelings, sensations. Warm blankets as they were wrapped around him. Lullabies that were sung softly into his ear. Male shouts and female whispers. The name Owen. But the people he vaguely remembered on Stewjon had given him up to the Jedi and their teachings, and Obi-Wan was replaced by Master Kenobi.

Master Kenobi had never had a family. Bound by the laws of the old Jedi Order, he was told that he merely was and then he would merely cease to be. His death would sadden the Jedi around him, but he understood that they would never mourn him. To die was merely to become one with the Force. But when Anakin was exiled, when Anakin was sentenced to a living death, Master Kenobi learned what it meant to grieve. What it meant to hold on to the past so tightly it was ripped from his fingers, taking a part of him as it went. The past could not be changed, could not be undone, and could not be held onto.

When he reviewed the events in his mind over and over again, when he saw what part he had played in Anakin's downfall, the grand design of events, the seduction of the dark side, he wished he could have done something differently. He wished Anakin would have confided in him. He wished Qui-Gon had been alive after all. In the end, Master Kenobi saw that the ending was only a beginning.

He remembered the Military Creation Act and its defeat in the Senate. He remembered the battle on Geonosis, the battle that ended a war before it began, a dead Dooku killed by Anakin's own hand and Master Kenobi's own lightsaber. They had worked together then. He had thought that they always would. When Palpatine's plans came undone, and his true nature was revealed, he fled from Coruscant and disappeared into the darkest reaches of the galaxy. He was hunted down by the Jedi, but the Jedi never found him. Palpatine had become a specter, a shadow, a phantom of a child's deepest nightmares.

One standard year passed, and then two, and when the third standard year began, Master Kenobi noticed a difference in Anakin. He became more anxious, more worried, more fearful, and as Master Kenobi meditated on the matter, he could not squelch the growing sense of alarm that gnawed deep into his gut, into his soul. Darkness was engulfing the galaxy again. Rather than stabilizing after Palpatine's departure, the Republic grew more volatile. Master Kenobi felt it, and then he saw what Anakin was hiding.

Attachment was forbidden to the Jedi. Attachment led to fear. Fear led to anger. Anger led to hate. Hate was the path into darkness. A path from which no one had returned. The standard day before Senator Amidala gave birth to her children was the day that Anakin confronted Master Windu, crying out that the Jedi were hiding secrets from him. Master Windu still bore a scar from that day, a mark that marred his right cheek. Master Kenobi found them on a precipice of the Jedi Temple, guided there by his feelings. Anakin was Force-choking Master Windu to death. It was an ability born of the dark side. Anakin told him he needed a way to save Padmé, that the Jedi were keeping her from him, that she would die because of it.

Master Kenobi should have known that Senator Amidala was the key to everything and to nothing. Anakin had not outgrown his childish fascination with her. He stopped Anakin, distracting him long enough for Master Windu to rejoin the fight. Together, they defeated Anakin, and took him into the Council's custody. Master Windu did not die that day, but a part of Anakin did, and so did a part of Master Kenobi.

Anakin was placed in seclusion in the Jedi Temple, confined to a meditation room until the Council could decide what to do with him. Master Kenobi visited him only once, on the first standard day of his confinement, and only for a few brief moments. Anakin looked forlorn. Anakin look worried. Anakin looked betrayed. Anakin looked angry. There was hate in his eyes. Master Kenobi calmly informed him that Senator Amidala had successfully given birth to twins only hours before. As he saw the fire in Anakin's eyes die out, he realized that his fear for the Senator was genuine, he realized that the Senator's new children were also Anakin's.

After that day Anakin refused to see his former master, refused to speak with him, and Master Kenobi was hurt. Anakin had been his brother, his friend, and now Anakin would talk to no one but Master Yoda. Master Kenobi would not know what broke inside of Anakin that day he embraced the shadows, but he learned of the circumstances during the countless Council meetings they had on the matter.

Palpatine was alive. Palpatine had manipulated Anakin. Palpatine had sent him visions, had sent him dreams. He had whispered into Anakin's ear that Padmé was in danger, that the Jedi needed to be destroyed. And Anakin had taken the bait.

The whole Temple was on high alert. The Council was far from pleased. They demanded that Anakin account for his actions. Master Yoda, his eyes attentive and his body tense, agreed that something needed to be done about the situation. Master Kenobi wished that he weren't on the Council at all. He didn't want to judge the only family he had in the galaxy.

But in the end, he had no choice. Master Windu called for Anakin's execution. Master Mundi advocated a lifetime of confinement. Master Gallia said that Anakin should be exiled. Only Obi-Wan could speak on Anakin's behalf, could defend his brother, could keep the sentence from burying Anakin under its weight.

The matter became more complicated when Senator Amidala came to plead on Anakin's behalf. After discovering what had taken place, what had happened to the father of her children, she begged the Council to let him go. But it was the fact that he was the father of her children that caused Senator Amidala to make a grave situation even more hopeless, caused her to speak in vain. She had come to save the life of her husband, and she had lost her children in the bargain. She said there was good in Anakin.

Master Windu was adamant. The children of Anakin Skywalker could become very dangerous. They must be placed under Jedi protection. They must be raised in the Jedi Temple. They must not have attachments. They were too powerful. They must not fall prey to the Sith, to the darkness. Senator Amidala implored, entreated, and beseeched. She was denied. She asked for the life of her daughter. There were conditions. Leia must have no attachments even in the outside world. She must not know who she was or the power she wielded. The day Senator Amidala bargained for her daughter, she lost her son and her husband both. The Skywalker women were now alone in the galaxy.

Master Kenobi could do nothing but watch. His words carried little weight. His actions betrayed his attachment to Anakin. His loyalty to the Jedi Temple was questioned. It was Master Yoda who decided Anakin's sentence. Twenty-two years of isolation on Mustafar. It would be time enough for mediation and for the righting of wrongs. What Master Yoda meant by that statement, Master Kenobi would never understand. So Anakin went to that fiery planet accompanied by Master Yoda and Master Yoda alone.

As the standard years came and went, as the Coruscanti seasons changed, as more missions were completed, Master Kenobi saw the Republic stabilize, saw Senator Amidala take control, saw Luke grow up and look more like his father than he would ever know. The older Jedi shied away from Luke, too aware of his heritage and of his resemblance to his father. And Luke never knew what it was that made him so dangerous. Or why he was given the harshest of all family names. Starkiller—the legacy of what his father could have done.

It was heart wrenching watching the boy as he grew and learned, as he became aware of what surrounded him. And Master Kenobi watched it all with a quiet pain that lingered under the surface. He took Luke as his Padawan. The Council viewed it as a sort of penance Master Kenobi had taken upon himself—correcting the father's wrongs through the training of the son. The Jedi could not have been more mistaken. Master Kenobi was training Luke because it was the only link he had to Anakin, and he wanted to do right by Anakin and by Padmé. Master Kenobi understood where Luke got his hardheadedness, his impetuosity. He understood where Luke got his compassion and his gentle heart. It was something the other Jedi masters would not have understood.

Luke was an excellent student, more than willing to be instructed. His abilities with a lightsaber spoke of talent that did not often belong to the young. His piloting skills were superb. He was aggressive in his lessons. He was patient in his mediations. But his visions often caused him to act rashly and without thought. It had gotten him into trouble on more than one occasion, particularly with Master Yoda. But when _the _Vision came, Master Kenobi knew he had a lot of explaining to do.

When he was fifteen, Luke began to guard Chancellor Amidala. It broke Master Kenobi's heart. How he wished things could have been different. Confused at why he had been given such a task at such a young age, Luke was told that it was part of his training in becoming a knight. He was told that he must use all his senses to protect those who did not realize they were in danger. Master Kenobi did not tell him that he was protecting his own mother, that his stunt as a bodyguard was little more than an excuse for the Chancellor to see him on a regular basis. After the first visit, Master Kenobi did not accompany his Padawan to these trainings. He knew that his very presence made the Chancellor ill-at-ease, that she could not bear to look at him, that she blamed him for everything that had happened to Anakin. He did not fault her. He blamed himself too.

Master Kenobi contented himself to listening to Luke's verbal reports on these excursions. He spoke of the Chancellor with respect, and once every few standard months, he spoke of the Chancellor with fondness underlying his tone. But it wasn't until his dreams, until the Vision increased in regularity that Luke confided in his master.

Master Kenobi saw Luke approach him hesitantly in their shared apartment, unsure of how he should phrase his question. "What is the matter, Luke?" he asked, looking at the boy warmly.

"It was a dream, Master. A strange one. I think it feels more like a memory," he answered hesitantly, "but it doesn't make sense."

"Why is that?" asked Master Kenobi, concern growing in his eyes.

Luke scratched his head before answering, "Because I was told that I was orphaned the day after I was born."

"What does that have to with this dream?"

Luke sighed, and Master Kenobi heard the frustration that emitted from it. He began, "I dreamt that I was on a greet planet. A wet one with lots of waterfalls. Alderaan, maybe. Maybe Corellia. There was a man there, and a woman. There was a girl there too. I was a small boy. The man was carrying me on his back. The woman was braiding small white flowers into the girl's hair." Luke paused. "I think it was my family, Master."

Master Kenobi looked at his pupil carefully, and thought about his answer. "The Force shows us many things that could have been, Luke. When did these visions begin?"

"That's the strange part, Master. They started after I began guarding the Chancellor."

"Perhaps the Force is trying to tell you something about the Chancellor," Master Kenobi encouraged, a sad smile lighting up his face.

"Perhaps," Luke replied. But he seemed just as confused as ever.

The answer to Luke's dream was poised on Master Kenobi's lips, but it would remain there silently. Naboo, Master Kenobi wanted to shout. The planet was Naboo. Shua flowers, he wanted to say, the celebration flowers Nubians put in the hair of those they loved. They grew in the Lake Country. Anakin, he wanted to scream. The man was Anakin Skywalker. Master Kenobi said nothing at all. What could he really say without admitting his part in the grand scheme? The eighteen-year-old boy took Master Kenobi's words with him as he went, but he looked more dejected and mystified than ever.

The Vision, as Luke came to call it, visited him with increasing regularity, especially after Leia came to live permanently on Coruscant. Luke thought she was the Chancellor's handmaiden. Her ward. The daughter of a dead friend who grew up in a household of adults. The two had an instant connection and the amity between them blossomed. It became such an inspired friendship that Master Kenobi had caught his Padawan stumbling into their apartment in the earliest hours of the morning, his night spent talking to Leia.

This friendship was such a strange thing. Among the Jedi friendships were permitted. Camaraderie was encouraged. Connections to other beings were essential for a Jedi's survival. Master Kenobi understood that Luke did not see the harm in making Leia his friend. But he saw the risk in Luke befriending his own sister.

It was not that Master Kenobi shared the Council's fear about the potential dangers in the attachments of the Skywalker children. He had stopped believing that a long time ago. It was that Master Kenobi feared what would happen on the day Luke discovered that he was befriending his sister—a twin whose existence he hadn't been aware of. A sibling whose existence he had been lied about his whole life.

But Master Kenobi did not discourage this friendship. Sometimes he even went with Luke to visit Leia, on the pretext that he had also been assigned to guard the Chancellor. He saw Leia the first time in aqua blue robes worn by the five other handmaidens. He recognized Sabé, Dormé, Moteé, and Rabé by his previous dealings with the Chancellor. He noticed a younger woman wearing the same-colored robes who he didn't recognize. Then he saw the youngest handmaiden. She had brown hair and brown eyes like the Chancellor, and like all the handmaidens for that matter. But she had her mother's eyes and Anakin's fire. And he knew she must be Leia.

He had tried to talk to her on more than one occasion. He had attempted to befriend her. Looking at her as she looked over the city-planet of Coruscant, as she carefully watched Senate dealings, as she wondered about his own intentions, he wanted to say something to her. He wanted to tell her about her father, about Luke. He wanted to beg her forgiveness for the part he had played in destroying her family. He never did. It was enough that he blamed himself for what he had done. He didn't need her, or Luke, resenting him, too.

It was with bittersweetness that Master Kenobi saw Luke knighted. The day his Padawan braid was cut was the day, his master thought about his own master. What would Qui-Gon have said about all of this? Master Kenobi couldn't bear the thought.

It was with words of encouragement that Master Kenobi told Luke to go with Leia on his first solo mission. The smuggler Solo would be vital in obtaining information on the Hutts, and the time spent with Leia would do Luke good. It would give him time with his family. And as Master Kenobi thought about family and the Hutts, he remembered a little boy on Tattooine and his promise to go back and free all the slaves.

The longer Luke was gone, the more Master Kenobi thought about family, the more Master Kenobi remembered Stewjon. And Owen. And one day, when the Jedi Archives were nearly empty, when the pain in his stomach seemed unbearable, when he was able to access the databases, he learned who he was. There were records of when he was born, when he was brought to the Temple. Who he was. Apparently, the Kenobi family was wealthy and involved in the local politics of Stewjon. The head of the Kenobi clan was a man named Owen. He had five children. As he took in this information, Master Kenobi thought about the life he could have had, the life he did have. And one day, he hoped to gather enough courage to visit Owen and tell him who he was—his brother, Obi-Wan.

In the standard days, the weeks, the Council sessions that came to order and then were adjourned, Master Kenobi pondered his findings, his revelation. He mentioned it to no one. Not Master Yoda. Not Luke. He meditated on it. He thought about it. And then Anakin was thrown back into the present again.

Anakin arrived at the Jedi Temple one day, presumably in the company of Master Yoda, although no one could really say for sure. He was immediately placed in Temple confinement by Master Windu, to the rooms at the far corner of the Temple that received no sunlight, no warmth. In a harsh twist of events, Master Kenobi was placed in charge of his well-being. He made sure that Anakin was given a warm place to sleep, that he received meals regularly, and in a daring act of insubordination, he asked Luke to assist him in the matter. Standing guard outside the durasteel door, Master Kenobi on one side, Luke on the other, they watched and waited for hours. Anakin's only visitor was Master Yoda.

Master Yoda arrived looking grave, heartbroken, and Master Kenobi even detected curiosity behind the Grandmaster's calm exterior. Several hours passed before Master Yoda left Anakin alone, and it was only later that Master Kenobi would learn that Master Yoda had gone directly from Anakin's presence to visit the Chancellor. Master Yoda gave Luke a look of pity as he left the cell, and although Luke did not understand its meaning, Master Kenobi saw that Luke recognized its intention.

Although he knew he was adding to Luke's confusion, Master Kenobi asked him to bring Anakin's food tray to him, citing that the serving droid was being held up elsewhere. He was giving Anakin a chance to see his son. He was giving Luke a chance to see his father. Anakin would view it as a taunt rather than a mercy. Luke would see it as the winding thoughts of an old man. Master Kenobi would let them think what they would. He wanted to make things right in as much as he could.

Two standard days after he arrived on Coruscant, Anakin was taken before the Jedi Council. Master Kenobi was there, watching him from the seat he had occupied for the last twenty-four standard years. And when he saw blue eyes staring back at him, he saw that Anakin was watching him too. And Master Kenobi let out a sigh. Anakin was broader now, no longer the slim youth he had been. His blonde hair was beginning to be streaked with grey. There was a hint of a beard on his chin. His clothing was still the dark tones he had preferred from his younger days. He looked like the old Anakin, but this new Anakin was quieter, more confident than arrogant.

As the proceedings began, Anakin refused to say what happened on Mustafar. He claimed only that he hadn't been the person he once was. When Master Windu asked if that meant he no longer had attachment, Anakin had shaken his head. Attachments, he had said, were the life-force of a Jedi. Master Yoda had no questions for Anakin, save one. He asked Anakin what it was he wanted, but his shoulders drooped in defeat as he asked it, as if he already knew the answer. Family, Anakin had replied, his family. The Council broke into murmurs as its members heard the answer. Anakin Skywalker had not learned to be a proper Jedi during his exile.

Master Kenobi could sense no malice from Anakin, no hardness. But he could sense chaotic passion and some anger hidden beneath his calm exterior. But there was also serene peace—and joy. The darkness had touched him, but so had the light.

And while the other Council Members argued and debated what had really passed in the last twenty-two standard years, Master Kenobi thought about the man who stood before him and the man he had been and the man he could be. For a brief moment, Master Kenobi saw the division of the past and the future by the present, and wondered at the possibilities. And Master Kenobi got excited.

Eventually, Anakin was led back into his cell, and a regular guard was placed on duty outside his door. Until three standard days later. Then Master Kenobi did something he normally would not condone—he tampered with the guard schedule. Rather, he had Arfour tamper with the guard schedule. He placed Luke on assignment the fifth standard day Anakin was in Coruscant, in the early hours before sunrise. And before the Council meeting that was to be held at dawn, he told Luke that he had to talk to Master Skywalker.

Entering Anakin's small room, Master Kenobi wordlessly gave him a dark cloak. Instructing him to put it on and to use the hood to cover his face, he led Anakin from his prison and into the hallways of the Temple. And although Luke did not question his former Master, the fear in his face told Master Kenobi all he needed to know. And it hurt him that Anakin saw it too.

He led Anakin down a maze of hallways, dodging beings and droids as they were encountered. For a few moments, Master Kenobi remembered the old days of espionage and fighting with his partner beside him. It made him smile. When they were one hallway away from the Council Chamber, he told Anakin to stop and peeked around a corner. Anakin followed suit.

And after twenty-two standard years, Anakin saw them for the first time. It was Padmé and Leia. And although understood that Anakin wanted to run towards them, Master Kenobi shook his head no, and walked to the Council meeting. For now, Anakin would have to be content with looking.

After he heard Chancellor Amidala speak, the familiar pain in his heart doubled in strength. But there was nothing he could do to ease that now. By the time Master Kenobi had been excused from Council, Anakin had left. Later, he learned he was back in his cell.

The Council remained firm in its decision to keep Anakin apart from the outside world, and Anakin stayed in confinement six more standard weeks before he was moved into one of the Jedi apartments. It was a secluded apartment, and it was guarded. But it was better than what Anakin had had before. And Master Kenobi knew that the time to act was now.

He arranged it with Sabé. They had renewed their acquaintance once Lady Amidala had become Chancellor, and he knew she would comply with his unusual request. On a night when the guards were more interested in a game of Sabacc than in standing watch, when all was quiet and in place, when not even Luke and Leia could distract their parents by their presence, Master Kenobi snuck Anakin out of the Jedi Temple and into the Chancellor's apartment.

It went against everything Master Kenobi had been taught to believe. But the old laws were being transformed. Change was coming. He felt it in the deepest part of his soul.

After that first night Anakin had left the Jedi Temple, Master Kenobi had begun to visit him on a regular basis. Although Master Mundi frowned on these visits, no one would deny Master Kenobi. And soon Master Yoda came to these sessions. And Anakin showed them. Anakin taught them. Anakin instructed them on the ways of the Force. And Master Kenobi saw things he had not thought possible.

Four standard months after he arrived on Coruscant, Anakin stood before the Council again. And while he would not tell them everything, he did say that his time in exile had lead to the defeat of Palpatine, and the restoration of balance to the Force. And because his words swayed Council members who unsure about him, because no one could deny freedom to the one who had destroyed the Sith, because Master Yoda advocated for Anakin, and because Master Kenobi did too, Anakin was given his freedom.

And the day after he was released, the Chancellor resigned from office. And although Master Kenobi wasn't sure where she was going, he made sure Luke went with her. Master Yoda gave the young knight an indefinite leave of absence from the Jedi Order. It was high time that Luke knew his mother, and his father. And in some small way, Master Kenobi hoped that he was keeping the second generation of the Skywalker family from making the same mistakes as the first.

It was the day after the Chancellor resigned that Master Kenobi found himself at her apartment, and on her balcony that afforded a superb view of the Jedi Temple; he felt someone come up beside him, and look at the view with him. And he smiled when he sensed her presence.

"What will you do now, Obi-Wan?" asked Sabé.

"I will do what I have always done," he replied looking at her. "I will be a Jedi."

"And if the time of the Jedi has passed?" she asked worriedly.

"The time of the Jedi will never pass," Obi-Wan reassured her calmly.

Sabé sighed and half-smiled, "You're not like the other Jedi. Do you know that?"

"I should hope not," responded Obi-Wan dryly. "I should hate to have Master Windu's sense of humor."

Sabé laughed and then sobered. "What if this bill goes through the Senate, to reform the Jedi Order? Change will come."

"Change has already come, Sabé. It just seems nobody else has noticed."

Sabé thought about that silently for a moment before she continued, "What will you do now?"

Obi-Wan shrugged and looked back to the imposing view of the Temple. "I plan to go to Stewjon and look for a man named Owen Kenobi. I want to tell him I'm the brother that was taken away. I want to lavish his children with gifts. I want to see where they live, who they are."

"Do it." Sabé encouraged. "You deserve happiness."

"And what will you do?" Obi-Wan returned. "Now that the Chancellor is no longer the Chancellor."

Sabé met his gaze. "What I've always done. Fade into the background. Wait until I am needed."

"You don't deserve to fade away," said Obi-Wan tenderly, squeezing her hand gently.

"You're not like other Jedi, are you Obi-Wan?" repeated Sabé. "You don't see any harm in having attachments."

Obi-Wan thought about what he wanted to say before he answered her. And when he did answer her, he recited the old Jedi mantra. Attachment leads to fear. Fear leads to hate. Hate is of the darkness. And then he told her what he had learned. Attachment leads to love. And with love, nothing in the galaxy is ever out of reach, nothing in the universe is ever impossible.

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**Up next...Sabe and how she fits into the story. **


	4. Lady Sabé

**A/N If you're reading this please review. so I know you're out there.**

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Sabé had always been good at fading into the background. Sabé had always been good at hiding herself underneath the fine frippery of duty. Sabé had always been good at fighting for the people she cared for. Sabé had always been good at taking orders. Sabé had always been…there was scarcely a time when Chancellor Amidala could remember her life before Sabé was in it.

But Sabé could remember the day she entered Lady Amidala's world. She had been thirteen years old. And in the twenty-some standard years that had passed since that day, Sabé hadn't forgotten. She remembered everything…the Battle of Naboo, Jar Jar Binks, Qui-Gon Jinn, Obi-Wan Kenobi, the treaties, the espionage, the physical endurance that her task required. It was daunting to remember. It was so much easier to forget, to forget like Lady Amidala did.

But Sabé swore she would never be like Lady Amidala. Because even though she loved her queen, adored her senator, respected her chancellor, Sabé didn't want to be the broken woman that she knew Padmé was. And she knew what had caused that woman to shatter into smaller and smaller pieces.

Sabé hadn't thought about Anakin Skywalker for a long time, although she remembered what he looked like. But the day Lady Amidala, now the Supreme Chancellor, asked her to stay behind in Naboo, in the Lake Country, to watch over Leia, Sabé reflected on the life of Anakin Skywalker, and she cursed the fates and she prayed over the women he had been forced to leave behind. She didn't approve of the way Lady Amidala was raising Leia, and even if everyone else believed that the Leia was only the Chancellor's ward, Sabé knew that Leia was so much more than that…she was the Chancellor's daughter.

She had been there the day Lady Amidala had given birth. She had seen pain in other woman's eyes, and it wasn't the pain of childbearing; it was the pain of someone who had lost what they held most dear in the galaxy. As the medical droid administered the procedure, Sabé had been the only living being in the room. And she saw as Lady Amidala looked wildly about the room crying for Anakin. But Anakin was nowhere to be found.

It was Sabé who bore witness to the fact that Lady Amidala had given birth to not one child that day, but two. Luke entered the galaxy shortly before Leia. It was Sabé who made sure the medi-droid's memory was wiped, so it couldn't blurt out anything to anyone. It was Sabé who found out why Anakin hadn't been present at the birth of his children. It was Sabé who relayed this news to Lady Amidala. It was Sabé who watched as Lady Amidala gambled with destiny, and lost, who was bound by the codes and laws of the Jedi Order even though she was not a Jedi. It was Sabé who watched as Leia was raised alone in a household of someone seemingly too important to care about it her. Yes, it was Sabé who watched over everything and everyone, whose unfaltering loyalty caused her to sacrifice her own life, whose unwavering faith caused her to move mountains.

But it was with a questioning gaze that Sabé accepted Lady Amidala's orders to watch over thirteen-year-old Leia, and it was with knowing eyes that Lady Amidala issued them. So Sabé did what she was told. She resigned herself to semi-retirement and to loneliness. And she watched over a little girl who had no inkling of her past…or her future.

But as that little girl became a woman, as one lifeday turned into six, Sabé was amazed at how quickly time had passed, and at how slowly time had passed. Leia spent her days with her tutor and her evenings with Sabé. While her tutor taught her history, writing, mathematics, sciences, and languages, Sabé taught her deportment, manners, stealth, self-defense, and politics. Leia might think that she was being trained to be a handmaiden, but Sabé hoped that in Leia, she would one day have another Nubian queen to serve. Leia was worth all that and more.

There was only one evening when Leia did not come to her lessons with Sabé, and her tutor had mentioned that day Leia had seen a picture of a young Lady Amidala. Like nearly everyone else on Naboo, the tutor wondered if Leia was Lady Amidala's daughter, but also like nearly everyone else on Naboo, the tutor wondered if she was not the daughter of Lady Amidala, but the daughter of one of the handmaidens—all these women bore a striking resemblance to one another. And because it was a difficult question to ask, the tutor did not ask it and neither did Leia. But Sabé felt that Leia had already found some of the answers to her own questions.

Sabé mentioned the incident with the tutor in her weekly report to Lady Amidala, and Lady Amidala took it all in stride. When Sabé quietly suggested that Leia join her on Coruscant, Lady Amidala shook her head. Not yet. As she did so, Sabé wondered about Luke and if his presence factored into Lady Amidala's decision. And not for the first time in her life, Sabé seriously considered cursing the Jedi.

It was two more standard years before Lady Amidala called Leia and Sabé to Coruscant. And it was with a sigh of relief that Sabé packed her belongings. Although she and Leia had grown close during their six standard years together, Leia needed her mother. And Sabé was glad to be in her old position, to be thrown into the world of glittering balls and political intrigues. And she saw how much had changed during her time away from Lady Amidala. And she met Luke for the first time.

She saw him awkwardly standing guard in the Chancellor's offices, and she sent Lady Amidala a questioning look that was answered with a slight nod. And as Lady Amidala went back to her work, Sabé watched her as she watched Luke. It was apparent to Sabé, who had known Lady Amidala since her coronation day, that she loved her son. It was evident to Sabé, who had known Anakin Skywalker since he was a slave-boy, that Luke looked just like his father.

Sabé had known Obi-Wan Kenobi for many standard years, since his Padawan days apprenticed to Qui-Gon Jinn. And although that had not always stayed in touch during that time, the last six standard years had been spent in constant communication with him. Just as Leia was ensconced on Naboo, studying to be the queen she could never be, Luke had been busy in the Jedi Temple, practicing to be the very thing he had not been born to be. And every standard week, as Sabé sent Lady Amidala a weekly report on Leia, she sent one to Master Kenobi too. And like two relatives privy to family secrets, they exchanged information. So although Sabé had not seen Luke until that day in Lady Amidala's office, she had known all about him. And although Master Kenobi had not met Leia until she was on Coruscant, he had known about her too.

But unlike Master Kenobi, she did not fear the consequences of the friendship between Luke and Leia. Where he was hesitant to mention it, Sabé encouraged it. And since Obi-Wan seemed careful not to mention Chancellor Amidala overly much, Sabé gave Luke detailed insights into the Chancellor's personality. Master Kenobi had once accused her of being too carefree about the situation, and Sabé had shaken her head. It wasn't that she believed that the circumstances were anything other than grave; it was that she believed the rules could be relaxed, the lines could be blurred. And in her heart, Sabé knew that Master Kenobi was afraid of what Luke would think of him, of what Leia would say when they found out the truth of the matter. And in her heart, Sabé knew that he would sacrifice himself so that they could know the truth.

Sabé had not been a queen or a senator, but she had known queens and senators during her lifetime. Sabé had not been a queen or a senator, but she could spin and weave intrigue like one. Lady Amidala had taught her well. As Sabé walked the halls of the Senate building, into the offices of the Senator of the Chommell Sector, she knew that Lady Amidala would not appreciate those talents being put to use in this particular manner. She was greeted by a handmaiden who introduced herself as Leleila, a Nubian woman from the mountains, Sabé guessed, if her name was any indication. Sabé asked to see the Senator. When asked on what matter of business, she had answered that it was a family matter. After Leleila had gone to confer with the Senator and once again reappeared, she motioned Sabé towards the Senator's office.

Entering quietly and closing the door behind her, Sabé sat in front of the Senator, and the Senator stared back at her. She had the same brown hair and brown eyes that made Lady Amidala famous, that made Sabé and the other handmaidens known. And Sabé smiled softly at her.

"It is good to see you, Sabé," greeted the Senator.

"I am glad to be here," said Sabé, "but the Chancellor did not send me," she finished answering the unspoken question in the Senator's eyes.

The Senator let out a frustrated breath, and the soft edges of her smile gently faded. Lady Naberrie sighed. "She is my aunt, and I haven't talked to her in years."

Sabé shrugged her shoulders delicately. "Does it matter?" she asked, looking carefully at the woman she was provoking.

"She's family. Of course it matters." And Sabé heard the exasperation, and the hurt, in Lady Naberrie's voice.

"She is not the only family you have not spoken with." Sabé said the words carefully, calculatingly, wondering if she would get a rise out of the Nubian Senator.

But like her aunt, Lady Naberrie did not grow angry, she only grew even sadder and more dejected. "I know about Leia," the Senator admitted dully.

"It wasn't Leia who I was referring to," admitted Sabé.

Lady Naberrie snapped her head up, and Sabé detected curiosity behind her cool demeanor. "Yes?"

"There is a Jedi at the Temple who has been knighted. His name is Luke Starkiller."

"Are you saying…?" Lady Naberrie let the question hang as Sabé rose regally from her seat.

"I have already said more than I should have," Sabé answered crisply as she walked toward the closed door.

"Sabé?" asked Lady Naberrie weakly.

At the sound of her name, she turned around. "Yes?" she answered.

"Why now?" asked Lady Naberrie.

"Because I have learned from a Jedi Master at the Temple that the standard years of Anakin Skywalker's sentence are almost complete. He will be back on Coruscant in less than one standard year." After relaying this information, Sabé took a moment to look at the Nubian Senator as she processed this information. And for a brief moment, she saw how young Pooja really was.

Anakin Skywalker was back on Coruscant less than eight standard months after Sabé had had her conversation with Pooja Naberrie, and as Master Kenobi told her what was happening, how the Chancellor had been summoned before the Jedi Council, Sabé's expectant smile turned into a frown of worry. And then she heard that Lady Naberrie had come to visit the Chancellor in her private apartments. They had argued and then the Senator had left. As to the nature of their argument no one could say…not even Leia who had been attending the Chancellor that day. And the pain in Sabé's chest tightened when Leia mentioned the odd look Lady Naberrie had given her.

But Sabé had unwavering confidence in Master Kenobi, and although she was not a particularly patient woman, she waited because the Jedi Master had told her to. Time, he had said, was of the essence. And in time, the broken pieces of a past life seemed to come together. When Master Kenobi had first proposed the idea to her, she had nearly laughed at the incredulity of his plan, but she agreed to it. But when Anakin was delivered to the Chancellor's apartments late one night, escorted by Obi-Wan, it was Sabé who allowed him into the Chancellor's apartments without alerting the guards, and it was she who gave him access to the Chancellor's rooms.

And as the sky of Coruscant went from black to grey, Anakin emerged from Lady Amidala's bedroom, Sabé was waiting for him. She had spent the night in the company of Obi-Wan ensconced in pleasant conversation…and laughter. Sabé and the Jedi Master were old acquaintances and good friends, and although Anakin raised his eyebrow at their companionship, he smiled when he saw how happy his old master seemed. And just as quickly as they had arrived, Anakin and Obi-Wan disappeared into the ever-flowing traffic of the city-planet.

Sabé had known Anakin Skywalker when he was just a slave-boy, an ignorant child lost in the sand dunes of Tatooine. And she had been there when the boy with the angelic looking face had suddenly become a man. And she knew that Padmé had fallen in love with him. And unlike Rabé, Moteé, Dormé, or Eritaé , who had been with Lady Amidala as long as she, Sabé knew about the secret marriage between a Jedi and a politician. Perhaps if she had not known, Sabé might have lived her life differently. But Sabé had known, and sometimes frustrated by the circumstances she could not change, Sabé tried to change them anyway. Sabé was not patient like Master Kenobi was, and neither did she have the sense of restraint she knew Obi-Wan possessed.

Looking back at the start of their friendship, at the companionship that grew between a Jedi and a handmaiden, Sabé knew that Anakin had brought them together, and were bringing them together still. Perhaps once upon a time, if Obi-Wan hadn't been so dedicated to the laws of the Jedi, the rules of the Jedi Code, things might have turned out differently. Perhaps once upon a time, if Sabé hadn't been so dedicated to her mistress, her life would be altered now. But some things were too late to change…while others weren't.

Luke and Leia had their whole lives ahead of them. They didn't have to make the same mistakes as the generation of their parents had. They were only twenty-two standard-years-old. Maybe Luke would be the Jedi who reformed the Jedi Order, maybe Leia would be the princess she was always meant to be. Sabé's lips curled into a sly smile. No one else might be aware of Han Solo's true identity, or of Leia's growing attachment to him, but Sabé knew and remained silent. Things would come to pass when they would. Sabé was not a patient woman but she understood that there was value in waiting…sometimes in waiting for the most opportune moment, sometimes in waiting for something to happen.

She watched for the latter as she saw Anakin and Padmé together, still meeting in secret. The day would come when Anakin would be released, the night would come when he begged Padmé to leave with him. She watched and waited for that moment. It came sooner than she expected.

Sabé supposed she should have known in the weeks before Chancellor Amidala announced her resignation what she was going to do. Suddenly, important legislature was being discussed in the Senate. Sabé learned that based on the recent information the Chancellor had garnered from Han Solo about the Hutts, on the mission that Leia had recently returned from, the Chancellor had decided to call for a vote in the Senate. And in an overwhelming majority, the Senate agreed to have trade embargos placed on around Hutt space unless all the slaves in Hutt territory were given their freedom. With those slaves free and immigrating to Republic terriroty, as they surely would, the possibility of enriching the Republic with tradesmen and craftsmen, was a pleasant prospect. Han Solo had told her that now was the time to act, internal fighting between the Hutts themselves had weakened them. And Chancellor Amidala, who been elected based on her platform of galactic stability and personal rights, has seemingly used this information to cement her image as both a benevolent and dangerous leader. It was a cunning political move. In reality, though, Sabé knew Padmé had pushed for this vote not because of her political image, but because she had promised a little boy a long time ago that she would help the slaves on Tatooine if she ever had the opportunity.

The day Chancellor Amidala called for a vote in the Senate about the reformation of the Jedi Order, Sabé knew that her resignation was not far behind. Such a vote was not in the rights of politicians and bureaucrats to make, Sabé knew. It was an issue for the Jedi Order and the Jedi Order alone. However, the vote would call attention to the Jedi and their recent activities. Such a vote would be debated upon and talked about for many standard months, but in the end the vote would be deemed unconstitutional. And the Jedi would be forced to act anyway. Maybe not for standard months or even standard years, but the reformation of the Jedi Order would happen within her lifetime. Of that, Sabé was certain.

It was worry for Obi-Wan that caused Sabé to ask him about the changes that were coming. It was the day after the Chancellor had resigned, the day Padmé had whisked her children off Coruscant and into the unknown reaches of space, that Sabé talked to Obi-Wan about it. Ironically enough, it was in the Chancellor's apartments, where Anakin and Padmé had spent so many of their nights, that she had asked him. And he had reassured her. And he told her about his family, about Stewjon, and about love. Sabé listened wistfully, her gaze going to the magnetic pull of the Jedi Temple. One day, maybe, she would feel comfortable walking down its holy halls. One day, maybe, she would be asked into its hallowed rooms. But not yet.

Sabé spent six standard weeks on Coruscant after Padmé left with Luke and Leia. Duty had called once again, and she had put on the guise of Lady Amidala, standing as a decoy so that Padmé could have some time alone with her family, wherever they were. Sabé's disguised presence kept the busybodies from inhibiting the Senator's privacy, and there were some matters of state that did need attending. Sometimes Chancellor Mon Mothma would come by Lady Amidala's apartments and ask Sabé where this form was or where that datapad was located. Sometimes Viceroy Organa would come by and assure Sabé that he, and Alderaan, supported Lady Amidala wherever she was. And Pooja Naberrie came by too, and she asked Sabé about Luke and Leia, who they were and what they were like. Often Sabé answered the young woman's questions, but sometimes, she didn't. There were things that Pooja needed to learn about her cousins on her own, information that could not be relayed by word of mouth.

And one standard month after Luke had left Coruscant with his mother, he returned to her apartments and sought Sabé out. He asked her questions, and she told him some of the answers. Sabé directed him to his cousin, the Senator of the Chommell Sector. And Luke left her presence gratefully, glad to have found this information.

Five standard weeks after Chancellor Amidala had resigned from office, a Jedi Master who was not Obi-Wan requested permission to enter the Chancellor's apartments. Sabé had him admitted. She recognized Master Windu from the descriptions Obi-Wan had given her. Startled at his presence, she offered him a seat, and he took it.

"May I help you, Master Windu?" she asked, in a prim and proper voice.

"Lady Sabé," greeted the old Jedi master, and Sabé raised an eyebrow at the title. "Master Kenobi sent me here."

"Oh?" Sabe questioned carefully.

"He suggested that you might offer some insight into the current…predicament of the Jedi."

"How so?" she asked, using as little words as possible.

"You are privy to certain information," explained Master Windu, coloring his words with suggestive tones.

"You are referring to the marriage of Master Skywalker and Lady Amidala? Yes, I know what happened all those standard years ago, and why it occurred. What is it you wish to know, Master?" questioned Sabé forcefully. She was protective of Padmé and her family, and that protectiveness showed through her words.

"It is not about Anakin and the Chancellor. It is about you," Master Windu said almost demurely, like a blushing bride on her wedding day.

Sabé tried to hide her smile behind her hand. "What about me?" asked Sabé, her curiosity piqued.

Mace Windu swallowed, and Sabé saw how hard this was for him. "Obi-Wan suggested that you might help me understand the part love plays in one's life, the love for another person, a real person, not an idea of something. Master Yoda might have…encouraged me to seek help on understanding the matter."

Sabé was at a loss. "I'm sorry, Master Windu, I don't know what to tell you."

"Tell me how you watched for all these years, knowing what you knew, loving Luke and Leia, and the Chancellor and even Anakin. You cared for them and watched over them. You looked after Obi-Wan too. And you did it out of love. Not duty." He paused for a moment to gather his thoughts, his voice becoming stronger and more confident as the words poured out of him. "I love the Republic. How do I learn to love its people?" he finished helplessly.

Sabé thought carefully before she answered the Jedi Master. "You and I do our duties out of a sense of devotion, Master Windu. But you love the idea of what something stands for, the Republic for instance, or the Jedi Order, and that idea is flawless in and of itself. Because it is an idea. I love the people behind the idea. For example, I respect what Lady Amidala stands for, but it is Padmé that I love. And sometimes I don't like what someone represents like Luke who has become the very thing that destroyed his father, but I still love Luke."

Sabé let out a deep breath, and watched nervously as the Jedi Master contemplated her words. "Thank-you, Lady Sabé," breathed Master Windu. "You have left me much to meditate on."

They finished their conversation, and Sabé politely walked him to the door. When he left she sighed in relief. That was not a conversation she had ever expected to have, and she was glad that it was over. Still, she was saddened by the idea of someone not knowing how to love.

Sabe was still considering this prospect when she sat in a garden on Naboo one standard year later. It was a rather large garden, actually, if the number of beings sitting on the benches was any indication. She watched silently, her breathing irregular, as Anakin led his daughter to a raised platform where a holy man waited. And where Han Solo waited too. She watched as Han and Leia exchanged vows of loyalty and love, and she squeezed the hand of Obi-Wan as she did so. He smiled from his position next to her, matching her expression of excitement…and of peace. She looked around the garden and spotted Luke sitting on a bench with his mother and father, having donned formal Jedi robes for the event. And Sabé noticed a woman next to him sporting flaming red hair. She had heard that she was Luke's apprentice, or something like that.

And Sabé sighed contently at the scene before her. For a moment, everything was going as it should.

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**Up next...you tell me :)**


	5. Senator Naberrie

As a young girl, Pooja Naberrie was unable to understand the trouble surrounding her Aunt Padmé. Aunt Padmé had always flooded every room she walked into with light and warmth. Aunt Padmé had always lavished Pooja and her sister, Ryoo, with gifts at every conceivable occasion. But suddenly the light was blown out and Aunt Padmé was no longer present at lifeday celebrations or anniversary parties. Aunt Padmé became a distant woman that Pooja saw in old holos.

Pooja could recall a moment when she was just six-standard-years-old. She was at her grandparents' house. She and Ryoo had been ordered to stay upstairs, away from the adults. There had been shouting and crying, and as Pooja snuck downstairs, she saw her Aunt Padmé around the corner, a stoic looking face staring back at her. Back in her hiding place, Pooja heard the words sky, walker, and senate, but unable to comprehend their meaning, she went to sleep that night even more confused about the events unfolding around her.

The older she grew, the more aware Pooja became that Aunt Padmé was more than just her mother's sister. She listened to the stories Ryoo told of their fairy-like relative, who had been a queen and was now a senator. The older the sisters grew, the more fantastic Ryoo's speculations became. Aunt Padmé was the victim of a tragic love story. Aunt Padmé was too busy to visit her family because she was out there somewhere saving the galaxy. But these teenage tales of heroics and angst soon developed into real adult theories of why Aunt Padmé and their mother were no longer on speaking terms.

The older she grew, the less Pooja thought about Aunt Padmé and the more focused she became on the mundane matters of every-day life. Ryoo, much like their mother, grew to love the simplicity of living on Naboo. But Pooja was restless, and she entered the Legislative Youth Program as a way to combat her disconcerted nature. In the workings of government, with its intricate puzzles and tangled webs, Pooja found a calling she had not realized she had and a talent she had not known she possessed. Although she had not been elected queen or princess by her twentieth lifeday, Pooja had come to love the swirl and bustle of intergalactic politics, and spent three standard years as Nubian Representative to Senator Binks, the Gun-Gun Senator of the Chommell Sector.

Jar Jar Binks was overly kind and socially awkward in a kind of way that made him endearing to Pooja. But most of all, she liked him because of the stories he told of her Aunt Padmé, the woman she had not truly thought about in a very long time. The picture Senator Binks painted of the warrior queen who led the Battle of Naboo, the beautiful woman involved in the defeat of the Separatists, the person who helped uncover the mask of Chancellor Palpatine, was not the impression Pooja had of the Chancellor. And the woman on the Holonet, who gave diplomatic speeches and danced to the careful tune of politics, was not the woman Senator Binks painted. And neither did it match the picture in Pooja's head of her beloved aunt.

Pooja had expected that talk of her Aunt Padmé would come up in Nubian politics and in the daily discussions of the Republican Senate. But she had not expected how personal these discussions would become, how much they would mean to her. And she came to wonder at the legacy she had inherited. Her grandfather had been Senator of the Chommell Sector, her aunt had been both Nubian Queen and Nubian Senator, and Pooja herself had become an official Representative of her home planet. It was almost a Naberrie dynasty, Pooja had reflected; from one generation to another the power of politics flowed. And Padmé Amidala had done more spectacularly than the rest of her family, having risen to the rank of Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic. It was a position that no one could overshadow, no one being could take away. It was a supremacy that was thrilling and exhilarating. Pooja wondered what it was like to wield such power. The thought was frightening and intriguing all at the same time.

While Pooja could recall with perfect clarity the tumultuous evening that had torn her family apart, while she could remember harsh words and shouted whispers, she wondered what had really happened that night. Because in the three standard years Pooja had been working on Coruscant as Representative, Aunt Padmé had refused to see her and did not want to meet with her. Lady Amidala refused her diplomatic appointments, her carefully scheduled social events. Lady Amidala's handmaidens turned Pooja away from the doors of the Chancellor's apartments. Although Pooja recognized the aged faces of Dormé and Moteé, the women did not recall the same recognition when they looked at Pooja's face.

Pooja was not so easily deterred. She listened, she learned, she waited. She reviewed her own past and that of Lady Amidala's, that of Aunt Padmé's. When she rose to the rank of Senator of the Chommell Sector, after the retirement of Senator Binks, she thought that surely Lady Amidala must see her now. Pooja was wrong, and in the long years of waiting for her aunt to summon her, she grew disheartened. As she carefully considered the puzzle pieces, thought about the gossip, the sly words her mother used to describe her younger sister, Pooja came to the conclusion that somewhere Aunt Padmé's past had to be connected to Leia.

Pooja knew about Leia. Everyone on Naboo knew about Leia. She was Lady Amidala's ward. Some sources claimed that she was the orphaned niece of Lady Amidala's former handmaiden, Cordé. Other beings claimed she was the daughter of Sabé. Still others speculated that she was somehow connected to Viceroy Organa and to Alderaan. But the whisperers mostly believed that Leia was the daughter of Lady Amidala herself. And so did Pooja. Someplace, deep down in her heart, she knew that Leia was her cousin. And when Senator Binks had mentioned the Jedi named Ani…it seemed everything clicked into place. Almost everything. It did not explain why Aunt Padmé had disowned her family, why they had not spoken in nearly twenty years. And Pooja's shining aunt remained shrouded in darkness.

With a patience that seemed to characterize the Naberrie women, Pooja waited while she fulfilled the tasks her role required. One standard year turned into two and then into three. She sifted through datapads of legislation. She wined and dined Senators and Representatives from Togruta and Mon Calamari. Leleila was brought on as her handmaiden and attendant. She attended balls and operas sometimes alone and sometimes with a dashing politician on her arm. Pooja's name was often linked to Axel Solo's, the Senator of the Corellian Sector and nephew to the current Corellian king. She visited Naboo regularly, becoming particularly close to Queen Kylantha. The two women were of a similar age and shared similar burdens. But not once in all those standard years, did Pooja see her aunt personally, and not once in all those standard years did she see Leia. She saw the handmaidens and the blond human Jedi that sometimes guarded the Chancellor, but it seemed Leia was hidden behind closed doors, secreted in mysterious rooms. And then Pooja realized something—Leia's true face was hidden under the veil of a handmaiden.

Pooja had been Senator for two standard years before Leia came to Coruscant, and she remained Senator for another two standard years before Sabé came to visit her. Pooja could recall that standard day clearly. It was a morning spent in an exhaustive legislative session followed by an afternoon of divulged family secrets. Unlike the other handmaidens, Sabé remembered who Pooja was. Unlike the other handmaidens, Sabé was not bound to the silence of the past. And Sabé spoke to Pooja and Sabé told her more than she had ever known before. And Pooja realized that while she thought she was moving the pieces on the dejarik board…she hadn't been even been playing the game.

It was the name Skywalker that made Pooja speechless, and Sabé had mentioned it deliberately. It was the name Luke Starkiller that caused her to lose the color in her cheeks, and Sabé had said just enough about it. And Sabé knew what she was doing. Of course, thought Pooja as she sat in her office, Sabé knew what she was doing. Lady Amidala knew what she was doing. Did they each know the secrets the other kept? What did Leia know about her own past? What was Luke's part in all of this? More importantly, what did the Jedi have to do with anything? They were the defenders of the Republic, promoters of justice and of peace. The Jedi withdrew from all attachments, from all forms of love. Unless…

Pooja spent the next six standard months searching through the Nubian archives. She was a Naberrie after all, and that great family had access to all the records they could ever want. Pooja spent so much time and effort in her work that Leleila commented on the dark circles under her eyes and Axel Solo commented on the weariness that hung over her shoulders. It was the name Skywalker that had caught Pooja's utmost attention. She remembered from that night so many standard years ago. Eventually, Pooja found what she was looking for. It was a marriage certificate for Anakin Skywalker and Padmé Naberrie for a ceremony performed at Varykino, in the Lake Country. And in the file with the marriage certificate were Nubian birth records for Leia and Luke Skywalker.

Pooja had found proof that Leia was her cousin. And she found proof that Luke was too. It was more than that, though. It was proof of a love story that never should have been, that never _could _have been. Ryoo's stories had been right all along. Looking on the standard date of the marriage certificate, Pooja saw that it coincided with the Battle of Geonosis and the defeat of the Separatists. Pooja began looking at those events with the carefully trained eye of a politician and thought about Chancellor Palpatine.

Palpatine had been every republican's greatest nightmare realized. He was the destroyer of freedom and of democracy. He manipulated people and emotions with god-like ability. He had orchestrated the events on Geonosis and Count Dooku, hoping to tear the galaxy into a civil war. But he had failed. Dooku was defeated on Geonosis by Jedi Knights Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi. It was questioning from Master Yoda that had caused Dooku to name his master. Palpatine had been confronted by a contingent of Jedi Masters on Coruscant led by Mace Windu. They failed to capture him, and Palpatine disappeared into the depths of the galaxy. He was believed to have died on Mustafar sometime after his disappearance although no one being could really say for sure.

Pooja shook and shivered as she discovered this information. It was terrifying. And she wondered where she would be, who she would be if Palpatine had succeeded. What her family would be like if Palpatine had succeeded. A chancellor could wield great power, unthinkable power, and Pooja realized it was a power she did not want to posses.

It was eight standard months after she began her research that Pooja discovered Anakin Skywalker had returned from his standard years of exile. And Pooja waited. She had finally understood the rules of the game even if she did not understand its intent—or the desired outcome. Anakin Skywalker and Padmé Naberrie had secretly married twenty-five standard years earlier. Three years after their marriage and the fall of Palpatine, Luke and Leia were born. Around the time Luke and Leia had been born, Anakin had been banished. Luke had been raised by the Jedi. Leia had been raised by her mother. Although Pooja could not understand why the twins had been separated, why they could not be claimed, she understood that the ways of the Jedi weren't hers to comprehend.

But although she discovered her aunt's secret family, it did not explain why Aunt Padmé publicly ignored her, why her mother didn't talk with her sister. Pooja believed that Aunt Padmé and Anakin truly loved each other, but how did she make Lady Amidala understand that she also understood, that she was also a part of this? Pooja felt as if a part of her childhood had been robbed. She had grown up without cousins to play with, without cousins to do all those family things with. She and Ryoo had always been the only children in the house. And now that Pooja was twenty-seven standard years old, she felt that life-long friends had been kept from her. And the only way to make Lady Amidala realize that Pooja also understood was to say the opposite of what she knew, to get a feel for the situation. It was an old political tactic her grandfather had taught her and that she often used.

After Aunt Padmé had been summoned by the Council, Pooja went to her aunt and demanded to be let into her private apartments. Behind closed doors she berated Aunt Padmé. She told her to forget Anakin, to let Leia live her own life. She told Aunt Padmé to leave the past behind. And in righteous anger, Aunt Padmé told Pooja that she didn't know anything about love or sacrifice. And Pooja found what she was looking for. Aunt Padmé loved Anakin with a burning passion, with an enduring love that could not be extinguished. It was the kind of love old Nubian storytellers used to describe. And Pooja had a sinking feeling that Aunt Padmé's disagreement with her Naberrie family stemmed from their misunderstanding and mistrusting of this love. After twenty-one standard years, Pooja had finally spoken to her aunt. She could only hope it would not be another twenty-one standard years before they spoke again. Pooja left the Chancellor's apartments that day, sending Leia a searing look as she did so. It was her first opportunity to really look at her cousin, and she wanted to burn the image into a memory she would never forget.

Pooja knew about Leia and about Luke. Leia was her mother's handmaiden and confidant. She was also a liaison between the Chancellor and the smuggler Han Solo who spied on the Hutts. She knew about Han too. He was Alex Solo's cousin and prince of the House of Corellia, even if he had renounced his family and his title. And Luke was a prominent Knight in the Jedi Order who was well on his way to becoming a master. He had been on several missions, including one with Leia. It wasn't much information. But it was all Pooja had.

Three standard months after Anakin had returned to Coruscant, Chancellor Amidala called for a very important vote in the Senate concerning slavery and the Hutts. Such a vote was a brilliant move when considering Lady Amidala's political career. It cemented her image as both a benevolent and malevolent leader. Pooja voted in favor of her proposal. She had no taste for slavery or any love for the Hutts.

Not long after the vote passed, Lady Amidala called for the reformation of the Jedi Order. Pooja was in the Senate Chamber when she called for a vote. Pooja heard the mutterings and the ramblings of the other beings. A part of her wondered at what her aunt was playing at. But another part of Pooja understood that this was Aunt Padmé's way of making sure no other being would suffer as she had. Aunt Padmé loved a Jedi and had a Jedi son. She wanted to make sure that they could love her back.

It had not surprised Pooja that the Chancellor had called for such a vote, but what had surprised Pooja was that immediately after calling for the vote, she had announced her resignation as Chancellor, citing personal matters as the reason. The Senate was in near chaos for a standard week even though Vice-Chancellor Mon Mothma was doing, in Pooja's senatorial opinion, a tremendous job.

It seemed as soon as she had resigned Lady Amidala disappeared from the planet with Luke and Leia, telling no one where she was going. Pooja knew that Sabé was acting as her aunt's decoy. And now that the veil of secrecy had been lifted, she visited Sabé eagerly and as often as she could. She wanted as many details about Luke and Leia as she could get. Most of the time, Sabé answered her questions in great detail, but sometimes she refused to give an answer, stating that there were things Pooja would have to find out on her own.

But when Luke ended up in Pooja's apartments a standard month after his mother's resignation, it was more than Pooja could have hoped for. She thought she was dreaming.

"Sabé told me that I should find you," began Luke carefully. "She said," Pooja heard the pause in his voice as he took a moment to swallow, "she said you know my mother."

"Luke," said Pooja gently, her heart breaking at his look of desperation, "I'm so sorry. I knew her once before you were born, but we have not spoken in many standard years."

Pooja saw the disappointment flash across his face. "Oh," he stammered. "I'm sorry I disturbed you, Senator."

"Don't be sorry," said Pooja kindly. "I have waited a very long time to meet you. I did know your mother once before she was Chancellor. I just don't know how to tell you…I thought maybe Sabé had."

"Told me what?"

"That I am your cousin."

Luke features were covered with shock, and Pooja watched as he rose from his seat to pace around the room. It was some moments before he was calm enough to take his seat again, calm enough to form thoughts and words. "In the Temple," began Luke uncertainly, "we are taught to believe that Jedi don't have family. Suddenly, I have parents and a sister. And now a cousin. I don't know what to make of it all." He looked uneasy.

"It's worse than that," said Pooja cheerfully, "You have an aunt and uncle, too, and grandparents, and I have a sister, Ryoo, and she has a husband, Dathan, and they have children."

"Why?" said Luke. And Pooja heard exasperation and frustration in his voice. And she knew his unspoken question had nothing to do with the Naberries.

"I wasn't there when you found out that your mother was your mother and your father was your father," she told him gently. "I can't imagine what it must have felt like to find out that your mother is, _was_," Pooja corrected herself, "the Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic or that your father is one of the most notorious Jedi in the history of the Order. And I suppose you know more of their story than I do. But regardless of who your parents are, _you _are a Jedi, and I am politician."

"Obi-Wan has warned me about trusting politicians," Pooja heard Luke mutter.

"Obi-Wan?"

Luke blushed slightly. "My master. He doesn't trust politicians."

"And with good reason," answered Pooja. "We all know what happened with Palpatine." Pooja took a deep breath. "But what I am about to ask you has nothing to do with my senatorial position. I merely asking you as a member of your family." She felt Luke studying her carefully as she brought her thought through to completion. "What is it _you _want Luke?"

"You are referring to the bill in the Senate about the reformation of the Jedi Order."

"Yes," stated Pooja simply.

"I want," Luke took a deep breath. "I want to meet my family, our family. But I am a Jedi. Reformation of the Jedi Order is inevitable."

"But who will make that change, Luke? The Senate has no jurisdiction."

"There are some members on the Council who will resist change."

"They may not have a choice," said Pooja definitively. She watched him as he thought, as he considered all the variables.

"Master Skywalker, Father, has shown me some things about the nature of the Force. Things I never thought possible. He wants me to transform the Order, and I think," Luke swallowed, "I think that is what I want to do. But I worry…Master Windu and I have not always seen eye to eye. "

"Then talk to Master Windu, and spend your life doing what you think is right," Pooja encouraged him.

The cousins spent the next several standard hours talking. Luke told her about his father and what he had achieved during his exile. He described Mara, the human orphan girl Anakin had picked up on his travels. He talked about what it meant to find out the Chancellor and Leia were his mother and sister. And he talked about Masters Kenobi, Windu, and Yoda. And when Luke left her apartments later that evening, Pooja felt as if she had just found something wonderful, something special. And she knew that she had finally found her cousin, and she had finally found a friend. And she couldn't wait for Ryoo to meet him or for Grandmother and Grandfather Naberrie to see him. He was Padmé's son after all.

The next nine standard months were spent in political discussions and business dealings with some time set aside for family matters. Luke went to visit the Naberrie family on Naboo, and he took Leia with him. Pooja was there as they celebrated Ryoo's thirtieth lifeday. But Padmé and Anakin were conspicuously absent. After all this time, Pooja had never had a sincere conversation with her aunt. And she sadly wondered if she ever would.

Pooja had heard from Axel Solo that Leia was getting married to his cousin. Han Solo was the black sheep of the family if Axel's description was accurate. She heard the wistfulness in Axel's voice, and it was one quiet evening on Coruscant when she gently broke the news to him. She didn't want to get married now. Not yet. She wasn't sure she ever would. She was more than content just being with her family at the moment.

It was with an unexpected suddenness that Padmé Amidala showed up at her door on Coruscant one standard day. Pooja invited her in, and the two women looked at each other a bit uneasily before Pooja decided a direct approach was best.

"I remember him, you know," started Pooja carefully.

"Remember who?" asked Aunt Padmé, confusion marring her carefully polite features.

"Uncle Anakin. I remember the first time you took him to Grandmother and Grandfather's house in Theed. It was two standard years old. It was before the Battle of Geonosis. He was nice to me."

Aunt Padmé was silent for a moment before she responded, "That's the first time I've ever heard Anakin called that."

Pooja shrugged her shoulders nonchalantly. "Technically he is my uncle. We're all family."

"Do you still consider me family?" asked Padmé, her tone neutral, her eyebrow raised, and Pooja saw that she was afraid of the answer.

"After you left, Ryoo used to tell me stories about you. She said that you were a star-crossed lover; that you were out saving the galaxy. I knew they weren't true, but they were fun to hear." Pooja sighed, her throat catching. "I never stopped thinking of you as family."

"And your mother?" asked Padmé tentatively.

Pooja laughed. "She says I'm too much like you. When I was growing up, she told me all the time that I would be the next politician in the family. Turns out she was right."

Padmé chuckled softly before forcing her expression into one of seriousness. "You were right, you know." Pooja heard the confession in her aunt's tone. "I should let Leia live her own life. She should not be bound to my mistakes."

"I hear she's getting married," Pooja offered. "To a Corellian prince no less. Axel Solo told me."

"Han," said Padmé. "Leia seems very happy, but I think," Aunt Padmé paused for a moment, and sighed before continuing, "I think Leia needs purpose in her life. Now that the Hutts are under Republic control…she needs a mission."

"Are you suggesting…?" Pooja let the question hang, but a slight smile played on her lips.

"Yes," said Padmé shortly. "She's getting married soon, but after the wedding, with her whole life ahead of her. She could be chancellor one day. She has the training, the education. She has the heart for it too." Pooja heard the hopefulness in her aunt's voice.

"She has you to guide her," answered Pooja gently. "And the galaxy at her fingertips."

Padmé got up to look out the window. She was greeted with a view of the Jedi Temple looming in the distance. "Luke…he is going to reform the Jedi Order," began Padmé uncertainly staring at the Temple.

"I know," said Pooja simply. "He's been telling me about it."

"But Leia…she can transform the Republic itself. Change it into something wonderful, something I could never make it."

"What are you asking me?" asked Pooja. She wondered what Padmé wanted, if her aunt was scared of trampling on her niece's hopes and dreams in order to promote her daughter's.

"Take Leia under your wing. Show her what she needs to know and why she needs to know it."

"Why me?"

Padmé turned from the window to look at Pooja. "Your mother was right. We are similar, but we are not the same. You have a sense of…propriety and…restraint that I have lacked in both my political career and my personal life. I became chancellor to protect my family not because of my ambition. Leia needs to be guided by someone who has not made my mistakes…and by someone who has not hurt her."

"I have a condition," stated Pooja as Padmé settled herself back on the sofa.

"Oh?" asked Padmé with a raised brow.

"Tell me what happened," said Pooja softly, "between you and Mom."

And Padmé Naberrie told her niece, described what happened all those standard years ago. How when Anakin was exiled, she returned to Naboo and told her family what had passed. The Naberries had urged Padmé to forget about Anakin Skywalker, to raise the daughter that she had. They told her to leave her political career and public life and to find some measure of peace in her private one. But Lady Amidala had done the opposite. She embraced politics and listened to Jedi law. Because Padmé would do anything to protect her family, anything to make things right. It was her penance, her sacrifice. And she did at all in the name of love. The Naberries hadn't understood what it meant to wait for things to be good again, and Sola did not have the same sense of patience as her sister nor did she understand what was truly at stake. They presumed too much…and they simply didn't understand. It was only with Anakin by her side that she could ever be peaceful and it was only with her children together that she would ever be happy. She did what she could. To raise Leia openly would have meant losing her and leaving Luke behind. To retire from public life would mean giving up on all the hopes and dreams Anakin had for her. It would mean admitting that Anakin was beyond salvation. It was not a perfect life, but it was Padmé's, the one she had fought so hard to have.

It was thoughts about fighting that Pooja Naberrie considered at Leia's wedding two standard months later. The things most precious in life are worth fighting for. And as she saw Leia and Han Solo joined in marriage, she understood that this was the hope Padmé had nourished in the years she watched her daughter grow. Padmé had wanted Leia to have the life she never could have imagined. And as Pooja glanced at Anakin, she suspected that his plans for his son were just as great.

Pooja had heard the old Jedi prophecy about the balancer of the Force. Pooja was a senator, she knew little about the Jedi and their Code, but Pooja understood that change was coming to the Jedi Order. Ushered in by Anakin, it would be completed by Luke. And Leia would transform the Republic, to make it into the incorruptible democratic institution that it once was. The Naberrie family would finally heal, and so would the galaxy. The second generation of the Skywalker family would mend the rift created by the first. And maybe in twenty standard years or forty, a golden age would be ushered into the galaxy…an age of righteousness and goodness, an age rooted in one family's love for each other.

* * *

**Mace Windu is up next...**


	6. Master Windu

**I hope I captured Mace Windu's character correctly. Enjoy!**

* * *

The Master of the Order sighed as he looked out the large window of the Jedi Council Chamber. He saw speeders zooming through traffic. He observed beings as they entered and exited the towering skyscrapers. He studied the senate building with its massive pillars and dignified representatives. In the far distance he saw the 500 Republica and the crystal glass dome that covered the penthouse suite. The watching Jedi saw the Galactic Republic; he saw Supreme Chancellor Amidala's Republic. And his heart was heavy.

This standard day was Luke Starkiller's knighting ceremony. Mace Windu sighed as he thought about that. It was difficult to believe that the boy was already twenty-standard-years-old. The Korun Jedi thought about all that had transpired before the boy's birth and all that had come to pass in the standard years after. As he watched the speeders soar by, Master Windu fingered the scar that ran from his cheek to his chin. And his face ached with phantom pain.

Master Windu forced himself to think about the boy's father. The father had been impetuous, hard-headed, impatient, and arrogant. It seemed that the boy took after his mother instead. He was patient, good-natured, kind, and fiercely loyal. For a brief moment, Master Windu wondered about the girl. Maybe it was she who had inherited her father's tendencies. In the next moment, Master Windu wondered about how the boy's parents had married, what had drawn them together. And his soul alighted with accusation.

Master Windu had much to blame the boy's father for. He had betrayed the Jedi Order. He had betrayed the Republic itself. And for that he had been given a harsh sentence. And for that, Master Windu refused to utter his name. For his name meant darkness and it meant unholiness. And he refused to give the boy his father's name. It was both a kindness and a disservice. It kept him from his mother and sister but it also kept him from visibly living within his father's shadow. But invisibly his name told the legacy of what his father could have done. His name was a warning.

Master Windu wasted no love or tenderness on the boy or his sister or his mother. Love was forbidden to the Jedi. And so was attachment. And so was emotion. And Master Windu had never committed any of these sins. His greatest flaw was his devotion to the Galactic Republic and his dedication to the Jedi Order. For many Jedi that was the equivalence of perfection. But maybe it was just enough of a fault that it clouded his judgment. But judgment had long since been passed and justice was being served. That was victory enough for Master Windu.

Master Windu thought about Luke Starkiller again. Obi-Wan Kenobi had been permitted to train him. It was penance for Master Kenobi—by training the son he was correcting the mistakes of the past. But Master Windu suspected that Master Kenobi harbored something akin to affection or the boy. Master Yoda had called this sort of training good for both Master and Padawan. Master Windu wasn't so sure. The father was Master Kenobi's weakness; the Order did not need him making the same errors. But Master Yoda's word was law.

Master Yoda had been there during everything. What he had not seen he had heard about. What he had not heard he had discerned from the miniscule details. The Hero of Geonosis, the boy who had helped stop a war before it began, who had played a part in the destruction of a dark lord o the Sith—he who had uncovered the identity of Palpatine, he had abandoned himself to the dark side of the Force. Master Yoda had seen the father's distractedness; he had seen that he disobeyed the Jedi Code nearly every standard day. Master Yoda waited for the plan to reveal itself. And it did.

Again Master Windu touched the scar on his cheek. It marred the right side of his face. The father had confronted Master Windu in a Temple meditation room, his eyes glowing with yellow sickliness and his words laced with hate. He said he had destroyed the Republic, that he had accused an innocent man and left him to die in the wilderness of the galaxy. And the father was right—from a certain point of view. It was Master Windu who had arrested Chancellor Palpatine on that fateful day. It was Master Windu who had battled him, dueled him until the Sith Lord fell from his window into the flowing city traffic below.

The father had shouted obscenities crying out that the Jedi were destroying the galaxy, that Padmé needed to be saved. They dueling pair had crashed through the crystal glass of a window, it was the glass that had cut Master Windu's face, and continued fighting on a precipice of the Temple. Master Kenobi had found them there, and Master Windu was sure that if he had not come, he would now be one with the Force, Force-choked to death. Master Windu visibly shuddered at the thought. Perhaps that was why he had allowed Master Kenobi to train the boy—it was payment for a deed that had brought them to this very moment.

And Luke Starkiller was given the rank of Jedi Knight. In a ceremony that included the Jedi Council, his master, and several of his friends—although, Master Windu noted dryly, the girl was not there. He had not been enthusiastic about the boy playing bodyguard to his mother and was reluctant that the boy befriend his sister, but again Master Yoda had spoken and again Master Yoda's word was obeyed. Even if Master Windu didn't approve.

In the hours following Luke Starkiller's knighting ceremony. Master Windu sought the tranquility that the Room of a Thousand Fountains offered. But it was a hallow peace he found. He had thought too much about the past that day to be truly at ease. It was there that Master Yoda found him, contemplating the future.

"Much young Skywalker has accomplished this day," began Master Yoda directly.

Master Windu bristled at the name but sullenly agreed, "Yes, Starkiller has proven that be is a credit to this Order."

"Disagreement, I sense in you. Conflicting emotions, you have."

"I worry about his past and how it will affect the future of the Republic," responded Master Windu curtly.

"Yes," said Master Yoda calmly, leaning back on his heels, "But remains two standard years do before the return of his father."

"Are you not concerned, Master?" asked Master Windu, the seriousness in his tone spreading to his tense body language.

"Questioning the will of the Force, are you, hmm?" said Master Yoda mildly and with a slight smile. "Learned not, have you, that in its own time the Force reveals all?"

Master Windu took the gentle rebuke with an inclination of his head. "But my concerns remain."

"Careful, you must be. Once had concerns, Anakin Skywalker did, and walked the path of darkness, did he." There was no lightness in Master Yoda's tone. The elder Master paused a moment before continuing. "Permission I will give Chancellor Amidala. Accompany his sister to Corellia, young Skywalker will."

The small green Jedi exited the large room, leaving Master Windu to contemplate all that he had been told and all that remained unsaid between them. In his mediations, Master Windu's mind drifted back into the past and into that fateful day when the father was exiled.

It had not been an easy decision, and perhaps it had not been the correct one, Master Windu reflected. The sentence had been a matter of intense debate. He himself had called for the father's execution. Master Mundi advocated a lifetime of confinement. Master Gallia said that the father should be exiled. Only Master Kenobi defended his former Padawan and pleaded for mercy.

The situation had been made even graver by the appearance of Senator Amidala, and the admittance of her two children's existence, and the truth of who had fathered them. And Master Windu found that he feared the children almost as much as the father. According to their midichlorian count, they had the potential to be unbelievably powerful. And such power could be easily manipulated. Master Windu feared the second generation of the family almost more than he did the first.

Master Windu contemplated all these things, the raising of the boy separate from the girl, the mother elevated to the most powerful woman in the galaxy, Master Yoda deciding the father's fate, the Republic that had been reshaped and reformed into Supreme Chancellor Amidala's image, the scar that the father had left upon the Jedi Order, and the undeniable feeling that something was coming, and it was coming soon. In the two standard years that passed as swiftly as the rising and the setting of the Coruscanti sun, Master Windu pondered all of this until the standard day the father arrived at the Jedi Temple and the time for thinking had past.

The father looked older and thicker and grayer. He had gained broadness to his shoulders and the muscles in his arms and legs were evident. He was an older version of the boy he had been, and Master Windu noted with some satisfaction that he no longer seemed cocky or arrogant. Although, Master Windu noted irritably, he had a confidence he should lack. He was not shame-faced and regretful. Oh, no. He was quite the opposite.

He was confined to a meditation room. It was not a benevolent act. He must be anxious to his wife and children. Master Windu's mouth was filled with disgust at the thought. Personal alliances should not be tolerated. Intimate relationships should not be condoned. Attachments went against the Code. As far as Master Windu knew, Master Yoda was the father's sole visitor.

Master Windu could not begin to imagine what had been said at their meeting. It had left Master Yoda drained and tired. He looked sad and dejected. And Master Windu could imagine all the standard centuries that had passed within Master Yoda's lifetime and all the individual problems and intrigues they held. Was it possible that this was the most momentous challenge that had passed in all those centuries?

Two standard days after the father had arrived at the Jedi Temple, he was summoned before the Council. He refused to relay what had happened during his standard years in exile. He did not speak of Mustafar. He did not say anything at all except to declare that attachments were essential to the Jedi and his family was the most important thing in the galaxy to him. Master Yoda drooped at this proclamation and Master Kenobi remained quietly thoughtful. The rest of the Council broke out in outraged whispers and murmurs. Master Windu could feel darkness within the father, even if it was a different kind of darkness than the one that had engulfed him all those standard years ago.

The Council called for the presence of the mother, Padmé Naberrie. They were at a loss at what else to do. Master Yoda told the mother of the Jedi summons and she arrived at the appointed time, brining her daughter with her. The fact that the daughter was with her left a bitter aftertaste in Master Windu's mouth. The girl should have been brought up in the Jedi Temple, under the watchful eye of its masters just as Luke had been. But again, Master Yoda had made the decision to let the girl live with her mother even if Master Windu had stipulated that the girl must never know her true identity.

The mother begged and pleaded and nearly wept at the feet of the Jedi Masters. She was a gifted orator and spun the facts to her advantage, asking for her family to be reunited. The masters were firm in their decision. What the mother didn't realize as she left the halls of the Jedi Temple was that the majority of the Council had not said no. They had just said not yet. For who in the galaxy knew what kind of a threat the father really was?

Within six standard weeks, when the Council was no closer to a decision, the father was moved to secluded Jedi apartments with a regular guard posted outside his door. The quarters were certainly more comfortable than the mean meditation room that he had been housed in. But it also offered many ways to sneak past the guards and out of the building. In the standard months that followed, however, it seemed these fears would be unfounded.

In the months of his Temple confinement, the father received two regular visitors—Master Yoda and Master Kenobi. The boy did not visit, and Master Windu assumed it was because of the strict orders that he not be told about his heritage or his origins. He was uneasy at the thought of the poison and the lies the father could inject into the minds of the two masters. Anything could tip the precarious balance of the stabilized Republic. It was Chancellor Amidala's Republic, after all.

It came as a surprise when the father requested an audience with the Council. But the Council was inclined to give it, provided that the father would actually speak and not remain mutely defiant. And the father did talk. He spoke about what had happened in the past. He did not apologize for his actions, but neither did he defend them. He spoke of the defeat and death of Palpatine. At the news, Master Windu inaudibly sighed with relief. It had been a matter of debate in the Jedi Order whether Palpatine still lived within this existence or had spoken to the father from beyond the grave.

The father spoke of balance in the Force, and in the back of his mind Master Windu recalled the prophecy of the Chosen One. He wondered at the will of the Force.

In the stunned silence that followed these declarations, the Council allowed the father out of his confinement. No one would deny the slayer of Palpatine his freedom. Not even Master Windu although he thought about the consequences of such an action. The father still held his family in higher regard than the Jedi Order. So Anakin Skywalker was released. Whether he was to remain a Jedi was still to be seen.

Master Windu nearly cursed the Council's decision a standard day later when Supreme Chancellor Amidala resigned her position. One wrong move and the galaxy could be thrown into chaos once again. The Republic could fall. And Master Windu watched with frustration. Because there was nothing at all that he could do about it.

Master Yoda met Master Windu in a meditation chamber to relay the news that Vice-Chancellor Mon Mothma had been sworn in as Lady Amidala's successor.

"Then we will wait," Master Windu replied stonily, "And see if the Republic needs us to defend its ascendancy."

"Little faith, have you. No trust have you, in Lady Amidala's plans."

"It is _him _I don't trust, Master. It was _him_ who asked her to reform the Jedi Order."

"How know you it was not her, that act she did for the sake of her son, hmm?"

"Even worse," said Master Windu soberly. "Because then we will have created a legacy to haunt generations of Jedi."

"What know you of love, hmm?" asked Master Yoda suddenly as he surveyed the Coruscanti skyline.

"I love the Republic and the Order," replied Master Windu automatically. "It is where every Jedi's heart should lay."

"A few standard days were you, when you were taken from your family. What know you about love that a mother has, hmm?"

Master Windu was sullenly silent in response.

"Learn about love, you must, or not will you understand the change the Force is bringing. Go to Obi-Wan you must."

It was four standard weeks before Master Windu sought out Master Kenobi. The two men were not close, especially not during the events that had transpired in the last twenty-two years. It was another standard week before Master Windu stood outside Lady Amidala's Coruscanti apartments, looking for the handmaiden named Sabé. And it was three more standard months before Master Windu placed himself before the Jedi Council asking for the title of the Master of the Order to be taken from him and given to Master Yoda. It was another six standard months before Luke Starkiller came back to the Temple, requesting an audience with Master Windu. Mace had been expecting it.

In the ensuing months after he had spoken to Sabé, Master Windu had spent even more time than usual meditating. He went on no missions off-planet. He was given no duties except the most formal ones. He did not seek the company of other beings nor did other beings seek his company. Master Windu contemplated in his solitude. And he saw visions of what the future would bring.

He saw an older Leia as Supreme Chancellor of a prosperous Republic. The Hutts had ceased to be a threat, and slavery was outlawed even in the remotest corners of the galaxy. He saw a glittering Senate chamber with Representatives from every Sector and Territory, including the Chiss and the Hapes Consortium. The Jedi were also represented. Luke had adopted the customary black of his father and the thoughtful gaze of his mother. And somehow, Master Windu knew reform had come to the Jedi Order. In the background he heard someone proclaiming the new Jedi laws. _Ignorance, yet knowledge. _ Then, he was brought back into reality.

Master Windu wasn't known for his displays of emotion, but after he had seen that particular vision several times, he wanted to weep at the profound revelation. A golden age was coming to the Republic, an age without war, without darkness, without despair. And it was the off-spring of Anakin Skywalker who would usher it into being.

It was with a newly found sense of peace that Master Windu had his audience with Luke. It was obvious that the boy had spent his time training with his father. For the first time Master Windu felt a sense of brightness coming from the boy that it nearly knocked him to his knees until it was suddenly dimmed by a shadowy darkness.

"Master," greeted Luke, bowing to the older Jedi.

"Starkiller," said Master Windu tonelessly.

"Skywalker," said the boy with a pained expression on his face.

"Skywalker, then," said Mace, correcting himself.

"Master," began Luke uncertainly, "Lady Amidala, that is, my mother, she…suggested that I should speak to you first. My cousin, Senator Naberrie, she is concerned about the Senate vote."

"The Senate had no jurisdiction over the way the Order conducts its business."

Luke swallowed nervously before continuing. "Perhaps. But perhaps change is what is needed, Master."

"So it is."

Luke looked dumbfounded. "Are you agreeing with me, Master?"

Mace shrugged. "Is that so hard to believe?"

"But, why?" exclaimed Luke.

Mace sighed. "One day, Skywalker, you will learn that with age does not always come wisdom. I have learned that I have committed grave wrongs against you and your family. I always acted in the best interest of the Republic. It is only later that I learned that it is only what I thought was best."

"Do you think reform is best for the Order?" asked Luke tentatively.

"I think reform is coming," said Master Windu dryly. "I can either fight it or embrace it."

"I am talking about more than the rule of attachments, Master."

"So I gathered."

Luke wet his lips before continuing. "My father learned things in the wilderness, Master. He has showed me what true balance is, true balance within the Force."

"And I assume you want to show others?"

"Yes, Master," said Luke nodding his head vigorously. "There is a girl my father found during his exile. She is Force-sensitive and trained in the dark ways. She wants to be taught."

"Show me, first," said Master Windu unexpectedly. "And then you can train the girl. The Council will support you."

In the standard months that came, Luke showed the Korun Jedi all he knew. He spoke of the Force. He talked about his family. And Mace witnessed how powerful love truly was. And he thought about the interconnectedness of the lives of every galactic being.

By the time of the wedding of Leia Skywalker to Han Solo, a rogue Corellian prince, Master Windu knew what it meant to have the balance that Anakin Skywalker had found, and he understood what it meant to have Luke Skywalker for a friend. Others had come under Luke's tutelage, including Obi-Wan although it was the girl his father found that Luke took as Padawan. She was named Mara Jade. She was a few years younger than Luke, and much too old to be considered a traditional initiate of the Jedi Order. Mace could recall when he feared the age of nine-year-old Anakin Skywalker. But the rules were changing, starting with this girl.

In the change that was slowly reforming the Order, it seemed all the laws were being broken and made new again. Nejaa Halcyon admitted to having a wife and a son in Corellia. Obi-Wan Kenobi had gone to visit his family on Stewjon. Other Jedi were retracing their origins, and soon marriage would be allowed. Maybe Mace himself would see the day when such an act was commonplace.

Master Windu had no family. He had been taken by the Jedi as a squalling infant, orphaned shortly after his birth. But he found comfort in the presence of certain Jedi, particularly Master Yoda, who also lacked blood relations in this galaxy. And once he began to form emotional attachments, he began to truly understand the meaning of friendship. Mace was finally able to let go of the righteousness that had consumed him for the last three standard decades.

And he spent his old age watching his vision unfold. Leia was made Chancellor of the Republic. Her family was young yet. She had twins who were being trained at the Temple by their uncle and an infant son who was rocked to bed nightly by his father.

And Luke was made a Master. He had not yet declared his undying love to Mara, but, Mace thought, that time would surely come. And soon.

Master Windu was never able to repair the rift between him and Anakin. Skywalker was still considered a Jedi, an informal one, but still a member of the Order. He had refused the rank of Master, and he had refused the Council seat that was offered to him. Some Jedi thought that Anakin still harbored bitterness for the years of exile he had to complete. Mace didn't think so. The slave-boy who wanted more than anything in the galaxy to be a Jedi was gone. He had been replaced by a man who wanted his family together and whole, who delighted in time spent with his wife, and enjoyed visits with his grandchildren. He had retired in the Lake Country in Naboo although he unofficially spent time as the Temple's head mechanic. Master Windu suspected he did it to spend time near Luke who, besides being a Master, had become a Council Member. And sometimes Mace spotted him going into the lightsaber classes and teaching the younglings who had come to love him dearly.

It was at the ceremony of Mara Jade, who had achieved the rank of Master, that Master Windu thought about that entire he had glimpsed of the future. And his heart was light, his soul was calm. And his scarred face no longer ached.

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**Next...Anakin. **


	7. Master Skywalker

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Anakin Skywalker looked at the sleeping figure outlined in the darkness. He breathed silently, his thumb caressing the lightsaber as he thought about where he was, as he thought about who he was. His ship hovered in space, several lightyears from the Hapes consortium, half a galaxy away from he was headed. His mind drifted to another bed, another night when he watched another girl sleep. His fingers tightened over his lightsaber, clenching the hilt.

"It's time for you to go back, isn't it?" murmured the waking girl, pushing her red-gold hair out of her eyes.

"It is," replied Anakin, not moving from his perch. His chair was positioned between the window and the girl's bunk. He lifted his hand, making the room brighten with illuminators.

The nodded and threw a jacket on over her sleeping clothes. "You were thinking about her. I could feel it." She continued to dress by hooking her lightsaber to her belt and then running her fingers through her hair.

Anakin blinked. The girl didn't seem perturbed by his lack of words. She must be used to it by now. "I'm going back to Coruscant."

"What do you think she looks like?" asked the girl curiously as she sat on the bed to pull on her boots.

"Now is not the time, Mara," said Anakin, his voice dangerously quiet.

"What about him?" she probed.

"You'll find out one day," he replied matter-of-factly, getting up from his chair. "I'm setting a course for Corellia. You'll work with Karrde until I get everything under control."

"And how long will that be?" asked Mara sharply, her green eyes lighting with liquid fire.

"A standard year, maybe," answered Anakin tonelessly, "maybe less."

"Jedi," spit out Mara venomously as she made up her bunk.

"One day you will meet a Jedi, and you will change your mind," said Anakin, his voice low, staring at his lightsaber as he said the words. Suddenly, he got up and headed to the cockpit, lost in his thoughts and his planning.

"What have you seen?" called Mara behind him, urgency in her voice. He ignored her pleas and walked down the hallway. "Anakin, tell me," shouted Mara with desperation. "Tell me."

But Anakin ignored her. He didn't share his visions with anyone. "We'll be in Corellia in two standard days," he called back to her.

Anakin settled himself into the cockpit of his ship staring out in the darkness as he thought about his past, and set a course for Corellia.

He remembered the day that Master Yoda had landed with him on Mustafar. It had not been a pleasant journey. He had been angry, coldly furious. He had been sad and forlorn. Frustration had built up within him. Master Yoda had landed the ship in the middle of a volcanic wilderness. Anakin was itching to steal the ship and fly it back to Coruscant and to Padmé, but something about Master Yoda's demeanor had kept him from it. There was something the ancient Master was hiding from him. And eventually Anakin would found out what it was.

Master Yoda stayed with him for a standard week, meditation and silence prevailing. Master Yoda did not let his guard down. He did not trust Anakin, and Anakin did not trust him. After two standard days had passed, Master Yoda said the time had come. He took Anakin into deep meditation, deeper than Anakin had ever been. And suddenly before his eyes, Master Qui-Gon had appeared. Anakin had cowered in shame and self-loathing, blinded by the bright brilliance of the dead master and by the childish vows he had sworn to this man.

Master Qui-Gon had spoken both gently and reproachfully. He had praised Anakin and berated him. He had said that love was powerful. It could both heal and hurt. It could manipulate and be manipulated. It could shine bright in darkness and be smothered by evil. Attachments could be dangerous. It was the first of many conversations Anakin would have with Qui-Gon over the standard years of his exile.

Master Yoda had left after the standard week was complete. He had reminded Anakin that his exile was a period of twenty-two standard years. He had reminded Anakin that he was the Chosen One who would bring balance to the Force. He had left other things unsaid. He pointed the direction of the nearest city and given him credits and his lightsaber. Then he left back to Coruscant. Looking back, Anakin suddenly realized that what he had taken for Yoda's indifference had really been the Master's great sadness at what had passed.

Anakin had spent the next standard year wandering around the galaxy, intermittently seeking out Master Qui-Gon. He resisted the urge to go back to Padmé and his children. He feared what the Jedi would do to his family. Even now, they were being punished for his sins.

The next standard year, Anakin found himself on Tatooine, on the doorstep of Owen and Beru Lars. He learned that Cliegg had died during the previous standard year. They took him in without question. They did not ask what happened to the Jedi or the beautiful woman he had once brought with him. Anakin helped Owen on the moisture farm. He fixed what needed fixing, built himself a speeder out of spare parts. He and Owen would occasionally talk about his mother. His stepbrother told him how Shmi had spent her last years.

One night, Anakin woke up from a restless sleep drenched in a cold sweat. He had heard Palpatine's voice in his mind. It was starting again. Anakin feared it. He dreaded it. The shadows were calling him. A part of him wanted to embrace them. He left the Lars farm at the next sunsrise. He took a small bag of belongings with him, including Shmi's diary that Owen had found buried in the sand.

The next standard year, he followed where the voice led him, going from planet to planet, system to system. It grew stronger with each standard week, more alluring, more enticing. It was only the thought of his children and of Padmé that kept him from succumbing. The last time he had listened to the voice, it had stolen his children and his wife from him.

Four standard years into his exile, Anakin Skywalker found himself back on Mustafar. He had tracked Palpatine to a simple dwelling. The battle that he found himself in was the most dangerous, seductive, exhausting task he had ever had to accomplish. The darkness called to him. It wanted him, and he wanted it. Palpatine gave him thoughts of revenge and visions of power. Power no longer held the allure it once did. All he wanted now was Padmé and his children. It was all in the galaxy worth fighting for.

Anakin could not remember how or in what way, it was all a blur. But somehow he had defeated Palpatine, and the Sith Lord was consumed by the lava that covered the fiery planet. Anakin sought meditation. He did not eat. He did not sleep. He did not consult Qui-Gon. He followed his senses. He stayed in Palpatine's dwelling and felt himself immersed in the dark side. From Palpatine's belongings, he learned about the Sith's life. From his plans, he learned about destruction. From his written files, he learned about hate. The Force tugged him away from that place and led him to Korriban, the home-planet of the Sith. He remained there for five standard years.

Qui-Gon was his constant companion. Anakin did not succumb into darkness, but he did not remain immersed in light. He did not welcome death, but he did welcome life either. He did not fight the hate that threatened to consume, but he turned into a righteous revulsion. He did not become angry, but he used his anger to channel his emotions. He learned to have a calm exterior while volatile emotions stirred beneath the surface. Most of all, Anakin learned that attachments were what kept him rooted in reality and in the light. He remembered his mother and his wife. He imagined what his children looked like. He thought of Beru and Owen. He considered Obi-Wan. He hadn't thought about Obi-Wan in a very long time. Sadly, he wondered what his former master thought of him. And Anakin pondered Master Yoda. It was he who had decided Anakin's sentence. Had he known something Anakin hadn't? What had the Force revealed to him? It was something that Anakin would think about for a very long time.

Anakin left Korriban a powerful man. He had learned to use the darkness without embracing it. He had understood what it meant to live in shadows the light reflected onto him. He knew what despair was and fought it with all his might. He learned what love was and gripped that knowledge tightly within his fist. He battled the darkness each day and conquered it each night. His uncertainty turned to confidence. His longing became acceptance. Truth burst forward inside of him. He had not noted the passing time or the movement of the planets. He found himself on Naboo, in the Lake Country.

He knew Padmé was off-planet. She was still Senator of the Chommell Sector, and she had duties on Coruscant. He hoped she was doing good. For all his training and his learning and his power, Anakin Skywalker still worshipped Padmé Amidala with a child's reverence. She had promised him she would free the slaves. He was sure one day she would find a way to succeed.

He prowled around the mansion in the darkness of the Nubian night. He had no business being there, and a part of him feared what would happen if he was discovered. He found the window he was looking for. He perched himself up on the third story and watched the ten-year-old girl sleep. He found that her Force-signature was strong, warm and welcoming, innocent and confused. She looked like her mother, but he sensed his fire in her. It was odd the Jedi had not claimed her as their own. He stole away in the morning light, realizing as he did so that he did not know her name. It would be the first of many nightly visits he paid her over the standard years. Silently, he watched her grow, and watched as Sabé watched over her.

Anakin spent the next standard years living anonymously on various planets. He worked odd jobs. He was mostly a pilot and a mechanic although he did work in the mines of Kessel for a time. He found himself on Alderaan fourteen standard years into his exile. He knew that Breha and Bail Organa were strong supporters of Padmé now that she was Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic. The Force had pulled him to Aldera and in the Aldera marketplace he was. Anakin found himself wandering through the crowd, glancing at the merchants that sold their wares. He felt the presence even if he never saw the hand that lodged itself into the pocket where his credits were stored. He caught the offender who, to his surprise, was a girl no older than his own daughter.

He learned she was an orphan named Mara Jade. Much to her disbelief, he gave her a hot meal and bought her shoes for her bare feet, sturdy black boots. When she admitted she had nowhere to go, he took her with him and set a course for Tatooine. He learned about her on the journey there. She was twelve-standard-years old, or so she thought. She was not Alderaanian but had somehow ended up on the planet. She was also highly Force-sensitive, leaving Anakin to wonder at her origins. He arrived at Beru and Owen's with the girl in tow. His stepbrother agreed to look after the girl, much to Beru's delight. After sixteen standard years of marriage, the pair was still childless. Mara was not happy with the situation, and Anakin sensed defiance and restlessness in her. He also sensed rage. He promised to come back in one standard year.

In the time he was away from Mara, Anakin continued to practice all that he had learned on Korriban. He also listened acutely to the Force. It led him to a man named Talon Karrde. Karrde was a smuggler who dabbled in other areas of business. Anakin liked him. He was honest despite his profession, and he treated those who worked for him well. It was the start of a partnership that would endure past Anakin's years of exile. Anakin became a spy, smuggler, fighter, and pilot for Karrde, the only condition in their loose arrangement was that Anakin would not go to Coruscant.

Sixteen standard years into his exile, Anakin went back to visit Owen and Beru and see how Mara was doing. She was not happy with him. He was one standard year late. At fourteen, she was outspoken and rebellious. She was unsettled and it made Owen uneasy. Beru loved the girl, but even Beru could see that Mara did not want to be on Tatooine. She was not made for life on a farm. Anakin decided to take her with him, and train her in the basics of the Force.

Mara proved to be an adept partner. She listened to him and took orders well. She learned to meditate and levitate minor things. She learned to listen to her feelings, how to use her anger and how to reel it in. She learned the basics of lightsaber combat. But Anakin would not teach her more than that. It was another master who would show her those things. He had seen it.

Mara and Anakin spent the next six standard years together. They worked for Karrde and did some of their own business on the side. Karrde seemed fond of Mara, and took good care of her during the times Anakin was away. And Anakin was away regularly. He stole away to see his daughter on Naboo until she was summoned to Coruscant. He did not see his son until past his twentieth lifeday, when he and his sister went to Corellia together on a mission. Anankin had followed their Force signatures across the galaxy. He wanted to weep. His soon looked just like him, but he sensed that he had his mother's gentle spirit and warm heart. The Jedi had taken him and made him one of their own. Even as Anakin looked at him, he knew that the Jedi Council had told him nothing of his origins.

Over time, Mara came to know what had happened to Anakin, why he wandered the galaxy aimlessly. She did not know the names of his wife or his children, but Anakin sensed longing within her. She yearned to be part of that special group of people. She openly showed her dislike of the Jedi and what they had done to him. He knew she wanted to ask why he did not take his revenge, but the looks he shot her kept her silent. He had taught her enough of the Force so she understood just how powerful he was. And he watched as she counted the standard years until the end of his exile.

The twenty-two-standard-years came to an end after a mission of stealth and intrigue for Ta'a Chume, the Queen Mother of the Hapes consortium, a woman Anakin neither liked nor trusted. But credits were credits and business was business. He ran down his version of events to Karrde before leaving Mara in his hands. The smuggler knew a bit about Anakin's past and did not ask any questions or expect to receive any answers. He promised to take good care of Mara.

Suddenly, Anakin found himself on the steps of the Jedi Temple. Twenty-two years ago Master Yoda had instructed him on what would happen, and he found himself following those instructions. He walked into the hallowed halls of the Temple, uncloaking his presence that he had hidden during his time in exile. He was immediately placed in confinement by Master Windu, not that Anakin had expected anything less. He and Master Windu had a history riddled with misunderstanding. It was Master Windu Anakin had attacked the day before his long imprisonment. It was Master Windu he had scarred out of hate.

In an ironic twist of events, Obi-Wan was put in charge of his well-being, and Anakin was sure it was because of that reason and that reason alone that he was fed regularly and given a pallet to sleep on. Master Yoda came to visit him almost immediately after his arrival. Anakin hadn't forgotten the kindness, for it was a kindness, that Yoda had shown him on Mustafar. He had given him credits and a place to go, a companion for the lonely journey ahead, instructions on what should be done. Master Yoda looked grave and heartbroken as he entered the bare chamber. He did not ask Anakin what had passed during his exile. He did not question the shadows that clung to Anakin like a warm cloak or the fiery light that shone from his eyes. That sat in silence and meditation together for several hours before words were even spoken. Master Yoda only asked Anakin about his attachments. Anakin had replied that attachments, that love, should be the very center of any being that followed the ways of the Force. Anything else was a deceitful lie. Anakin saw the great green eyes of the Jedi Grandmaster fill with sadness and some unnamable emotion. Later, Anakin would realize what it was.

It was fear. Master Yoda feared what would happen to the future of the Order. He was unsettled by Anakin's comfort with darkness. He was forlorn at the way events had unfolded. Yoda had kept his family apart afraid of what would happen if they were brought together. Afraid of what would happen if they were not brought together. Master Yoda left, and Anakin was surprised to see his son enter his chamber.

He wondered at what Obi-Wan was playing at. Perhaps the old man was doing him a kindness. He studied the boy as he set the tray down on the floor. Anakin saw the softness of Padmé's features in his face. But his eyes were hallow, and Anakin sensed the boy's dread. Somebody had told him Master Skywalker was to be feared.

"What is your name?" asked Anakin suddenly, his voice sounding harsh and hard to his own ears, deep and foreboding.

The boy cleared his throat before answering, "Luke Starkiller, Master."

Anakin watched as Luke's adam's apple bobbed and his hands shake. "Are you a knight?"

"Yes. I have been for two standard years."

"Who was your master?" demanded Anakin. He saw Luke begin to sweat.

"Master Kenobi, Master," said Luke as his fingers drifted closer to his lightsaber.

"What is your primary duty?"

"I watch over Chancellor Amidala." Luke hand was now on his lightsaber.

Anakin's lips betrayed a hint of a smile although he made sure Luke didn't see it. "See that you watch her well," he said softly.

"Yes, Master," said Luke nervously as he backed out of the room and shut the door behind him. It would be the last time Anakin would see his son for nearly six standard months.

Two standard days after his arrival at the Temple, Anakin was summoned before the Jedi Council. He was no longer the impetuous boy who once stood before them. He recognized Master Mundi, Master Gallia, Master Windu, and Master Kenobi. The faces hadn't changed, even if they had aged. He said nothing except what was absolutely necessary. He claimed he hadn't been the boy he once was. Master Windu questioned his attachments. Anakin said he believed attachments were the life-force of the Jedi. Master Yoda asked only one question, a question Anakin was sure he already knew the answer to. Anakin replied that his family was the only thing he wanted in the galaxy. The Council broke out in outrage. The purpose of Anakin's exile was to cure him of his inane beliefs. He was led back into confinement.

Anakin spent the next three standard days in deep meditation. On the morning of the third day, Obi-Wan arrived in the small room. It was the first time they had been alone together since before his exile. But no words were needed. There were no feelings of malice or spite between them. Anakin sensed his former master's intentions. He took the hooded cloak Obi-Wan and handed him and followed him out the door. He saw that Luke stood guard and looked apprehensive as the pair walked past him and into the hallway. One day, Anakin swore to himself, he would erase all traces of doubt and trepidation from his son.

Anakin followed Obi-Wan down the maze of hallways that he remembered well. They looked the same after all these standard years. And they led to the same places. The pair avoided the prying eyes of other Jedi and the metallic questioning of droids. Finally, one hallway away from the Council Chamber, Obi-Wan put his finger to his lips and looked ahead. And for the first time in twenty-two standard years Anakin saw Padmé. He wanted to run to her, hold her in his arms and kiss her senseless. Obi-Wan sensed his intentions and shook his head, no. Anakin watched as he entered the Council Chamber and as Padmé followed him. It was after this that Anakin noticed the handmaiden that had accompanied his wife. It was after probing her Force-signature that he realized he was staring at his own daughter.

She was beautiful. She had her mother's coloring and grace. He watched her for several standard hours, until the moment that the Jedi exited the chamber. Then he spirited himself away back to his confinement room. It was the hardest decision he had ever had to make. But he did as the Force directed him. It was telling him to wait. Anakin did not want to sacrifice his son for the sake of his wife and daughter.

Seven standard weeks after that day, Anakin not only found himself in more comfortable chambers if still in seclusion. Again Obi-Wan had appeared, and again Anakin dutifully followed, evading the guards and found himself being taken across the city-planet into the senatorial district. Sabé greeted them as they landed and pointed Anakin in the direction he wanted. He opened the door to a dimly lit room, the sadness and oppression he felt nearly paralyzing him where he stood. But when Padmé saw him, it disappeared amidst the happiness and warmth she felt. And for the first time in a very long time, Anakin felt joyful.

They were shy with each other, and it took time for their bodies to get reacquainted. She was older than she used to be, almost forty-nine standard years old. She tried to hide the laugh lines and graying hair that had cropped up during his time away. He was unsure of himself and his aged body. It was the happiest night of Anakin's life. They loved, and talked and planned. She asked about his time away, and he told her everything. She told him her hopes and dreams. They spoke of their children, and they mourned over their ignorance. They did not know their origins or their roots.

Over the next four standard months, Anakin snuck out the Jedi Temple to see Padmé. Sometimes Obi-Wan came with him and visited Sabé. Other times, Anakin went alone. Husband and wife made plans, discussed what it meant for Padmé to leave her position, discussed what she could do about their plight in the Senate, their children's plight. She promised him that before she left, she would free all the slaves in Hutt space. She had been working on it for some time. They both wondered what they would tell their children, how they would explain what had happened.

During this time both Master Yoda and Obi-Wan visited Anakin in his confinement. Roles were reversed and Anakin became the teacher as the two masters watched and learned. Anakin taught them about darkness. Anakin showed them true fear. Anakin demonstrated to them the meaning of true power. And Anakin explained what it meant to truly love. It was love that made the planets orbit and the suns shine bright. It was love that could brighten a room and chase away darkness. It was love that that could turn enemies into friends and friends into family. It was love, all of it…that was true balance in the Force.

Although neither Obi-Wan nor Yoda understood the love a son had for a mother or a mother for her son. Although neither one of them could comprehend the love of a wife for her husband or a husband for his wife. Although neither one could understand the desperation that came from brokenness, the strength that came from despair, the order that could come from chaos, the listened, they learned. They began to alter their own lives.

When the time was right, four standard months after he arrived on Coruscant, when Padmé told him all was in place, Anakin stood before the Council again. This time, he told them of the defeat of Palpatine, an act that could not go unpraised or unrewarded. And because Obi-Wan and Master Yoda advocated for him, Anakin was set free.

He arrived in the Lake Country a standard day before Padmé and their children. He walked the halls of the old mansion that held so many memories and unsaid hopes. He explored the grounds and went swimming in one of the many lakes. He laid in the sun and stroked the white shua flowers that grew all around him. And then they arrived.

Luke still feared him even after Padmé had explained all that had happened. Luke feared the Master Skywalker he had been told about, and he was angry at the mother who watched him every day. She had not told him or explained to him even when he saw his heart was breaking. And Luke fingered the lightsaber clipped to his belt, confused at what his father had told him about the true nature of the Force.

Leia was a different matter. She had always suspected the truth about her mother, even when she had not been told. But she had never known who her father was. She claimed that she remembered the man who watched her from her bedroom window. Anakin sensed that she too was torn—but not by the truth. Someone else held her heart now. After one standard month, Leia went to him and Luke searched for the cousins Padmé had reluctantly told him about.

Anakin found himself alone with his wife. But their isolation would not last long. He told her about Mara and Owen and Beru. They found themselves traveling to Tatooine and then to Karrde. And while they did not explain to them all that had happened, they said enough. Mara was delighted to see Anakin again and looked at Padmé with curiosity. The three spent the next three standard months working together with Karrde, finding a way to topple the reign of Ta'a Chume and place her son Isolder on her throne.

Luke found them on the plains of Dathomir, and finally reconciled with him. He finally called Anakin father and the former chancellor mother. He and Mara verbally sparred and fought, and Anakin had to hide a knowing smile behind his hand as they did so. He trained Luke in what he had learned during his time in exile, showed him the true nature of the Force. When he was ready, Anakin sent him back to the Temple to Obi-Wan and Yoda, when the time was right, he would send Mara to him, so that she could learn the ways of the Jedi.

Leia, Anakin's little girl, got married. Han Solo was most definitely not the man Anakin would have chosen for his daughter. He was callous and crass, and a smuggler to boot. But Karrde spoke highly of him and so did Padmé, and as Anakin learned that this wayward Corellian prince was to thank for the ban on slavery, he felt his heart soften. He thought Leia was beautiful on her wedding day, a ceremony in the gardens of the Nubian Lake country, a white veil on her head, her hair braided with shua flowers arranged by Padmé's own hands.

As Anakin aged, he felt himself settling more and more into a quiet life with Padmé and their family. He was still a Jedi in the most unconventional sense. He did not feel the need for the Order's approval after all these years. He wanted to be a father and a husband more than he wanted to be a Jedi.

It was many standard years after Leia's wedding, at the Temple's main hangar where Anakin was tinkering with an x-wing that Mara found him. He already knew what she had come to tell him, and he smiled at the thought. He had seen this day a long time ago in a vision that told him of Leia's rise to Supreme Chancellor and Luke's acceptance into the Jedi Council.

"You know," she accused him as she leaned over to see what he was working on.

"I've always known," he answered as he worked with the hydro-spanner.

"You couldn't always have known," said Mara, rolling her jade green eyes.

"Since the day I left you at Beru and Owen's," replied Anakin, pushing his graying hair out of his eyes.

Mara snorted and folded her arms. "Why don't you ever tell anyone about your visions? You could chart the future with them."

Suddenly, Anakin stood up and wiped off the hydro-spanner as he placed it in the tool box. "Mara," he said gently, "Things need to unfold on their own without the interference of living beings. I learned this the hard way." He embraced her in a tender hug. "I have always thought of you as my daughter. Now, it's just more official."

Mara laughed and kissed her future father-in-law on the cheek. "Luke wants to have the wedding here at the Temple. What do you think?"

"I think," said Anakin swallowing, "that once I would never have thought I'd see the day when all my children would be together, happy, and embraced by the Jedi Order."

The pair stood their solemnly for a while before walking out of the hangar and into the bright Coruscanti sun.

It was true that Anakin never revealed his visions to anyone. His visions were both source of happiness and great pain. He was not a prophet, but if he could prophesy what was to come, he would tell his family they would have ten-fold the happiness for all the tragedy they had endured. He would say that his grandchildren would help shape the galaxy. He would say the change in the Jedi Order was only beginning, that hope would carry on through the generations. He would say he was the most fortunate man in the galaxy, that the Force had smiled upon him and the people he loved. But he would not say these things. The future needed to unfold quietly and without his prodding, without his anger and his hurt infused into it. Because a great future was coming for the second generation of the Skywalker family and the third and the fourth. It was about more than a golden age for the galaxy. It was about a utopian age in history where the light that created the shadows dwelled in every being and loved reigned eternal among the Jedi.

* * *

**Next...Han**


End file.
